The Eternals
by Morgan Coldsoul
Summary: The adventures, misadventures, and near adventures of a trio of unlikely friends throughout Faerûn and the multiverse. Based on and updated around an actual, currently running Dungeons and Dragons game.
1. Foreshadowing

High in the Desertsmouth Mountains, the spire of the archmage Ethric's citadel towered over the treacherous Shadow Gap, looming two hundred feet into the air. The great valley at its feet was large enough to embrace a fair-sized town in its encircling arms: great, jagged ridges of stones that could themselves have been the very roots of the mountain. A smaller keep plugged the only navigable gap into the valley, and a great fissure, dropping down through the earth into a blackness of inestimable depth, ringed the tower itself. The natural moat was spanned only by a single bridge, which arched gracefully from the gatehouse on one side of the gap to the massive entryway of the citadel on the other, passing through the protective shield wall halfway across, which was itself a forest of smaller towers. The entire complex was constructed of a solid black marble, veined with green, which seemed _grown_ more than hewn from the very rock of the mountains.

It gave one the definite feeling that visitors were not, as such, welcome.

Through the tower's highest windows, lights flickered: The normal yellow of lamplight, occasionally interrupted by bursts of an ugly, acidic green that ate at the eyes and was the visual equivalent of a damp finger run around the rim of a glass. Looking into it was like peering into a slit cut into some other universe, one filled with an emerald fire so incredibly hot that it had passed through normal thermodynamics and into the other side of absolute zero. It speared through the night and illuminated the bellies of the thunderheads above, which swirled with malevolent purpose.

Two wizards were having an argument.

* * *

"I forbid it." Ethric's voice was flat and hard, like the rock face of the mountains outside.

"You _forbid_ it?" the younger man echoed incredulously. Like his older counterpart, he was slender, but it was the muscular slenderness of a dancer or swimmer rather than the emaciation brought on by eighty years of missing too many meals. His voice matched his figure—a liquid, silvery tenor that any bard would cry themselves to sleep over, rising with ease into the upper registers of finely-tuned outrage.

Ethric's eyes narrowed dangerously. "I _will_ not be argued with, Sandro. I took you on as my apprentice only as a favor to your sainted mother in the first place—how she tolerates such behavior as this in her own home, I shall forever wonder—and you agreed to my terms when you accepted that position. You will study what _I_ tell you to study, _when_ and _where_ I instruct you to do it. I can be no clearer than that, I believe."

"Of course, O mighty archmage!" Sandro sneered. "And shall I lick your boots for you, as well?"

"Scrub those sulfur stains off the floor while you're down there, if you would."

The apprentice made a noise usually only associated with creatures that went around in jungles with stripes on and pretended to be dapples of sunlight on the forest floor, typically near the local watering-hole.

"What do you expect me to say?" Ethric growled back. "If you ask a foolish question, you should expect a foolish answer to be the only kind forthcoming."

"All your answers are foolish, you wretched old hedge-wizard!"

"Tread carefully, stripling!" the archmage barked. "My patience with you is nearing its end!"

"'All things must come to an end,'" Sandro retorted, his tone mocking, "including your vaunted 'patience,' I expect. Bah! You preach and harp upon the values of research, of maintaining a broad range of knowledge—'a wizard is a sage first and foremost,' indeed—and then you propose to punish _me_ for doing no more than following your instructions? Your hypocrisy is astounding, _master_ mine." His voice left no doubt about his opinion of the honorific; it could have etched his words onto glass.

"My instructions were _not_ to seek out the dead for tutelage!"

"Your _instructions_ were to use all the resources at my disposal to advance my training," Sandro countered, wholeheartedly reinforcing all the Faerûnian stereotypes regarding redheads. "What have I done that was so terrible?" he added, bringing his astonishing aptitude for diplomacy into play. "You are liberal with your praise for the other magicks, but a little necromancy and you grow red and flustered as a country virgin on her wedding night! You cannot expect me to believe that you, of all people, have never galvanized a corpse."

"The dead," Ethric grated from between clenched teeth, "are to be respected, and left in peace. You have no idea what sort of power you are dealing with—tapping into the very forces of life and death themselves! In the hands of the inexperienced, necromancy can warp the fabric of existence into something best not contemplated. Whether I have or have not performed such magic myself is immaterial; the issue at hand is that _you_, of all people, should not be trusted with it."

The young mage blanched as his teacher threw his words back in his face, then responded in a voice so full of venom that he could have spit lacework in adamantine.

"_Should not be trusted?_" he hissed, a whisper that could make the very rocks crawl off in search of safer pastures. Vicious green light flared up in the archmage's study once more.

"Do you think I have not seen the hunger in you, the lust for power in your eyes when you unroll a new scroll, when you hold a fully-charged wand in your hand? You must overcome your thirst for dominion over the magic before you can be allowed to fully master it—or will I be held responsible for unleashing a black monster upon the world, another dark wizard with a taste for blood?" Ethric fairly trembled with anger. "Look at yourself, even now! See what you are becoming!"

And indeed, as Sandro glanced down with a frown to where the old man pointed, he saw the telltale swirls of green around his tightly clenched fists. Viridian balefire, shot through with black, writhed between his fingers and up his arms like something spawned half of mist and half of dragon's breath, coiling in a sinuous, caressing cloud into the air. Occasionally, a looping prominence would arc from one knuckle to another, like a small sun relieving itself of some incredible internal pressure.

"You expect me to place the power of the Dark Arts in the grasp of such a hand as _that_?" Ethric said very quietly, jerking Sandro back to reality.

"I _expect_," he replied, as though explaining something to a child, "for you to allow me to choose my own path. I agreed to be your apprentice, not your simulacrum."

"And as an apprentice, you have failed, so it seems we must try the other."

"Perhaps you should look to your faults as a teacher before you condemn the student for his lack of success!"

"You crave mastery over the soul itself in order to control death," Ethric said coldly, "and that is something, my foolish apprentice, that I _will_ not teach you."

"I seek to _avoid_ death, not to control it!" Sandro snarled. "By projecting your _own_ limitations onto _me_, you force me to dread what lies ahead—I look at you, withered and dry for all your power, and fear that I may become as you! What good is magic if one can live only through its continued good graces?"

"So," Ethric sighed, suddenly seeming very small and old, "you strive for immortality, then. Eternal youth." He shook his head. "Necromancy is something I _will_ not give you, Sandro—but to live forever is something I _cannot_ give you. You must indeed find it for yourself, and I see now that you are determined to look, even though you shall never find it here."

Both the archmage and the necromancer were silent for a long moment. Finally, Sandro spoke.

"So, then," he said, his hot rage replaced by a creeping cold one, far more insidious and infinitely more dangerous—the anger of hatred, of scorn, of paradise lost. The air of the room quickly became chill with it, and Ethric shivered. "You have nothing left to teach me."

That was all. He turned, moving like some great hunting cat, and strode to the chamber door, his shoulders stiff with the burden of his pride.

He paused in the arched doorway, turning to look over his shoulder with a sinister smile. "I shall tell my mother, upon returning to Shadowdale, that you send her your best," he said by way of farewell, and his tone was somewhere between honey and something dripping from the bottom of a coffin.

Then he was gone, and Ethric watched him go, saying nothing as the door slammed shut with a hollow _boom_. Where Sandro's hand had touched it, the wood was already turning black with rot, tendrils of corruption creeping through its surface, and the polished handle was gritty with a thick rash of rust.

The archmage stood, pondering the multiple possible meanings of his apprentice's parting words, until he heard the clatter of skeletal hooves echoing up from the rocky valley below. Then he went to the window and closed it, just as the rain started.

He had a rare moment of precognition, one of those freak glances into the realm of destiny that are given only rarely to human beings, but always to small animals looking up at a grin with a striped tail attached.

The future was looking back at him, and he didn't like its expression at all.


	2. Homecomings

Sandro was halfway down the tower by the time the echoes of the slamming door had died away, the stride of his long legs eating up the steps in a fast, angry walk that was nearly a jog. He had made his case, and he had made his decision. Now he had to make his escape.

It did not take long to gather all of his belongings from his chambers; the alchemy equipment and other furnishings all belonged to Ethric, anyway. He packed his satchel with chalk, ink, wax, paper—all the tools of his trade—and slung his scroll organizer over his shoulder. Taking the chest from the foot of the bed, he piled his personal effects—travel kit, clothing, cauldron, and the ever-present mirror—into it, snapping it shut with the lock from his spellbook's case.

The spellbook itself, bound in solid adamantine with pages of engraved mithral foil, he dropped in its slipcase and tossed in his satchel, along with his map case. He paused in the act of throwing a hooded, black satin cloak over his shoulders as he caught a glance of himself in the full-length scrying mirror that hung on the wall. He was tall, lithe as an elf, with a shock of unruly, medium-length hair—not _orange_, like some "redheads," but true blood-red locks, straight and silky. Jade-green eyes, almost feline with their near-imperceptible slant, stared back at him out of a pale face that sported the high cheekbones of his mother, offset by his father's square, but pointed, jaw. His nose was straight, his mouth sensuous but petulant, revealing sharp, fanglike canines when he grinned at his reflection.

Like a cat, he was vainly hesitant about covering himself, perceiving such an act as denying the world at large the opportunity to drink in his appearance. He was one of those narcissistic people who _knew_ they cut a fine figure, and couldn't stand other people not knowing, which was why nearly all the clothing he owned was a mish-mash of short, open vests, skintight leather breeches with dangerously low waistlines, and little dangly things crafted from silken mesh and chain links—all of it, naturally, in blacks and grays.

Tonight, though, practicality won out, and he shrugged the cloak the rest of the way onto his shoulders, throwing the hood up. There would be no one in the pass to appreciate his otherworldly good looks—besides, it was going to rain, anyway. It wouldn't do to get his hair wet.

He hung his dagger on his belt, opposite his spell component pouch—both finely-made gifts from his mother, Aslenne—and took from its rack near the door his most prized of possessions, save his spellbook.

It was a scythe, so finely-wrought that it could only have come from the forge of an elven or dwarven craft master. The shaft was a straight steel pole, as tall as he and burnished to the sheen of high-grade silver, its foot a vicious barb that could easily double as a spearhead. The long, curved blade was inlaid with a filigree of gold wire, and sharp enough to cut through the proverbial silk handkerchief, its edge a shadow's breadth from the razor keenness that, normally, only magic can achieve.

It wasn't magical yet, but he was working on it. Sandro's father, Zoltan, had been of the opinion, during his son's formative years, that even a wizard should know how to use a weapon, since, eventually, even the greatest archmage can run out of spells. He reasoned that a spellslinger who could hold his own in close combat would be better able to ration his precious power, finding no practical point in incinerating someone who could just as easily be dispatched with a sharp bit of metal. Sandro fully supported this theory, and intended at some future date to demonstrate the effectiveness of his father's philosophy to his enemies by enchanting the scythe until it smoked.

Struggling, Sandro managed to cradle the weapon in his elbows and grapple the chest; the problem of the door took a bit longer, but, eventually, he made it into the stairwell, and thence to the base of the spire. In the center of the large first-level chamber was an anatomical model of an equine skeleton, an odd bit of sculpture amongst the other strange furnishings that came standard with a wizard's stronghold. The young necromancer set his chest beside it, propping the scythe between a handy pair of ribs, and heaved a two-wheeled wooden cart from the jumble of bric-a-brac that filled the room. This he affixed to the horse's skeleton, managing with some difficulty to attach the device, which was intended for creatures of flesh, to the calcareous model. Once the macabre steed was safe between the shafts, he loaded his chest into the cart, filling the remaining space with a fine, silver-inlaid black saddle and harness, then covered the lot with a sheet of canvas to protect it from the rain. At last, he climbed into the seat and took up the reins, laying his scythe across his knees.

_When I kill you and claim this place for my own, Ethric_, Sandro thought grimly, _I shall have a proper stable constructed._

He paused, savoring the thought for a moment, then clicked his tongue and snapped the reins.

The skeletal beast animated suddenly, starting forward in horrific facsimile of a horse's canter with no preamble; it simply went from motionlessness to action. Grinning smugly, Sandro spoke the command word that opened the quadruple gates, and sat back to enjoy the ride as his undead companion carried him out into the rain, and northeast, to home.

To Shadowdale.

* * *

Elsewhere in the region, the night was clear and filled with stars. The leaves rustled as a playful breeze ruffled the trees of Cormanthor. Somewhere, an owl hooted, and a wolf howled in response.

Trendal, son of Furalith, knelt in a clearing at the center of the forest, his scimitar unsheathed beside him on his right, a stout halfspear laid close to hand on his left. His hide armor creaked as he shifted position for the first time in what felt like hours, and was probably days.

He concentrated, drinking in the sounds and smells of the woodsy evening with his entire body; he could _taste_ the blood of a fresh kill on the tongue of a hunting cougar, _feel_ the damp forest loam beneath the feet of a grazing deer. He could sense the _life_ of the land, beating with a slow, steady pulse all around him, swallowing him up with its enormity.

He opened his eyes slowly, filled with a preternatural calm. Across the clearing, a huge gray wolf sat on its haunches, watching him with eyes like molten gold. He met its gaze fearlessly, staring into the depths of those great yellow orbs; reaching out with his mind, he called it.

The beast cocked its head to one side, as though listening to something only she could hear—Trendal was sure it was a _she_, now—and silently padded across the clearing toward him. Halfway there, the wolf passed through a pool of shadow, and a beautiful elven woman, scantily clad in green armor crafted from wood and leather, emerged from the other side.

A river of hair, silver as moonlight, streamed out behind her, and her gold-tinged skin was patterned with green and blue tattoos that curled, vinelike, around her slender limbs and torso. She made no sound as she moved, only looking at him with eyes as golden as the wolf's had been.

"Stand," she commanded softly. He rose slowly to his feet, and she placed a hand on either side of his face—a task made easy because they were of a height—then rose up on tiptoe to bestow a single kiss on his forehead. Her lips burned like a brand on his flesh, filling him with tingling sensation akin to the pins-and-needles in his still-numb legs, and he felt inexplicably stronger.

"You are ready," she whispered, her breath cool as a breeze on his ear, her voice like water rippling over stones.

"Then it is time," Trendal replied, and his own rather pleasant tenor was rough and harsh in his ears by comparison. He pushed his gold-wire-rimmed spectacles back up onto the bridge of his nose with one finger.

The elven druid nodded. "You must return to Shadowdale. We have given you all we can; now it is up to you to do the rest." She paused. "I hope your quest meets with success; the loss of a sibling is a wound that never heals, an ache not meant to be borne by children such as yourself."

"I'm a grown man," he replied tartly, with a boyish smile.

"Perhaps among your own people, you can now be considered so," she conceded. "But to an elf, you are barely more than an infant in swaddling. Still," she added, "I believe you have much ahead of you, and now you are capable of facing it without turning aside."

"Thank you, Sylvianna," Trendal said seriously. He bowed deeply to the elven woman. "For all you have done, I am grateful."

"Take her words to heart, human man," said a deep male voice from the shadows behind Sylvianna. A large horse stepped, as silently as the elf had, into the clearing; its coat was blindingly white, with a flowing mane and a long, tufted tail. Its eyes and cloven hooves were golden, as was the long horn that sprouted, gleaming, from its broad forehead.

"You have the gift," the unicorn continued, its tone very matter-of-fact, as though it were simply stating the future instead of trying to predict it. "I can sense it. You will carry the power of these woods beyond the forest's edge. It will go with you when you leave. I think you will succeed."

"Gileam is rarely wrong about anything," Sylvianna told the young man wryly, "a fact that he is slow to let us forget. And he is correct now—here, away from 'civilized' Cormanthor, on the edge of the wilderness, the fringe—I can feel it. The land has spoken to you, and it will guide your path. Trust in its power to guard you, and to heal your sister."

"I will," Trendal gravely agreed.

"Come," she bade him as she mounted the unicorn, almost seeming to flow onto the creature's back. "Gileam will bear you to the forest's end. You must go tonight."

"Is it so important for me to leave right away?" he wondered, climbing up behind her. "I wish to be on my way, but I thought that I could at least take my time and enjoy the journey back; it's only a few days travel from here to Shadowdale."

He gasped and gripped the elven woman's waist tightly as Gileam sprang into motion, nearly flying through the trees, soundlessly galloping across the night-filled woods.

"I think it is," Sylvianna responded, although Trendal didn't hear. The druid closed her eyes, listening to what the forest was telling her.

"I think it is important. Something wicked this way comes."

* * *

Though it was late, and the evening made darker by the heavy storm overhead—a cloud cover that had lasted more than a week—the inside of the Tower of Ashaba was still brightly lit, and the lively music that poured from an upper window seemed fit more for a summer picnic on a level greensward than for a dark and rainy night in the Twisted Tower.

Arkantis was always a little too cheerful for everyone else, and now was no exception. Thunder and lightning or no, he was determined to enjoy himself, and his lute was working hard to spread the joy of his song throughout the entirety of the fortress. There was a heavy thump on the other side of the thick stone wall against which the young bard had propped himself, and he chuckled mentally as he began to count.

Settling himself more easily against the headboard of the bed, he redoubled his efforts to educate the world at large, with regard to the endless possibilities for romance that lay between an enterprising elven youth and generations of human shepherdesses who hereditarily brought their flocks to the same pasture near the forest's edge.

_Three…_

Arkantis's voice, though growing stronger with training, had never been very good—especially for an ambitious bard—and he had, by and large, made little attempt to correct the situation. He had long ago mastered the surprisingly complicated fingerings of the lute, as well as a half-dozen other stringed instruments, and that was good enough for him. He whimsically assumed that the voice would train itself, if he used it occasionally; in the interim, there was nothing quite like a strong, loud, _off-key_ baritone to awaken the denizens of Ashaba.

_Two…_

The lute had been a gift from his mother, in fact, when Uther—Arkantis had long ago stopped thinking of the grim old knight as _father_—had forbade him to sing anymore, loudly proclaiming that his voice was neither entertaining to listen to nor useful for making his way in the world. Always supportive of her younger son, however, Annah had procured the lute—once owned, played, and then discarded by Finder Wyvernspur himself, before his ascension to godhood—so that Arkantis could continue to practice his music without drawing as much attention to himself. As a result, he had become much more of an instrumentalist than a vocalist.

_One…_

He had always been a disappointment, he knew. Uther had wanted another strong, strapping, brainless prat like Shadrian—another knight to train up and then lead around, doing the gods only knew what for the Lord of Shadowdale. But Arkantis had been sickly and weak, unable even to hold a sword or stay on a horse, much less wear armor, and so he had been cast out to find his own way. The way of the Harpers.

Well, Uther would quickly revise his opinion when the offspring that he had so readily shunted off to one side returned to Shadowdale, rolling in gold and famous the world over in songs of his own making.

_Now…_

His door slammed open. "What, by Milil's hair and harpstrings, do you think you are doing?" the slender blonde woman in the archway shouted shrilly at him.

Unconcerned, Arkantis finished the last verse of his song, ending with a trilling, drawn-out note that was remarkably close to the right one. Growing up in a sickbed, and for half of that in his bookworm of a cousin's household, he had acquired some small intelligence and learning, but had never developed that caution or common sense that comes so naturally to other children, who played outside and got their arms broken. He spent too much of his time being glad that he was now capable of walking around and holding an instrument at the same time to waste effort on practical wisdom. The only reason he had survived this long, in the rough-and-ready atmosphere of Mourngrym Amcathra's stronghold, was probably that it was so hard not to like him that people who wanted to hit him gave up and went away instead.

The young man looked slyly sideways at the fuming woman, without turning his head. "What are you doing up so late, dear teacher?" he asked in his most innocent voice.

Her eyes narrowed, and she leveled an accusing finger at him. "Don't pike with me, you leatherheaded sod. I'm surprised Mourngrym himself isn't up here right now to give you a sound thrashing; I've more than half a mind to sew your fool bone-box shut myself!"

Unless one knew her, it could take awhile to work all the way through one of Golden Chord's sentences. Apparently, the story amongst the other Harpers went, she had been a bard long before becoming a priestess of Finder Wyvernspur, and had, during that time, spent a number of years…somewhere _else_. No one knew how many years—some said she had only been gone a short time, others said two decades, maybe more, although she didn't look much past thirty—and no one knew what other place. Nearly everyone who had any magical training at all, including the little snatches of lore and power that a bard often picked up, knew that there were other levels of existence, other _worlds_, where someone could go; but not very many—at least not in the Dalelands—knew much more than that. Wherever she had been, Golden had picked up a wealth of experience, a library of songs never heard in the Dalelands or in Cormyr, a full-body tattoo job consisting of sinuous black patterns, a new name, and someone else's entire vocabulary.

Her eldritch tattoos were writhing now, like snakes under her skin, as they always did when she was irritated. "How many times," she grated, "have I told you? Never mind—even _I_ can't remember. Too many. But mark you this: You'd better tumble to the concept of waking hours but quick, if you can find the dark to bang your fool brain-box on it, or I'll pen your name in the dead-book personally." She said it with a dreadful finality.

"Yes, ma'am," Arkantis said obediently, giving her a trite look of completely fabricated repentance.

"Why, I ought to—" the cleric started, but suddenly cocked her head to one side, closing her mouth instead. After a moment of silence, she said, "What in Finder's name is that?"

Then he heard it, too—a steady _clop-clopping_ outside, like distant hooves on the muddy stones of the road leading to the Twisted Tower. Curiously, he rose, setting his lute on the bed, and opened the nearby window. Golden, far too short to peer over his shoulder, shoved him out of the way instead so she could look out into the night.

"Sodding barmy," she muttered. "A berk would have to be either totally clueless or completely sodding barmy to be out on a night like this. Must have come up from Shadow Gap, too; no word from the Mistledale road all evening."

"The Shadow Gap. So?" Arkantis grunted, unconcerned.

"So," Golden mocked, elbowing him in the side as she strode past him, still clad only in her shift and a robe, "who do we know from the Shadow Gap? Let's go down and greet our interesting traveler."

"Can't the guards deal with it?" he called plaintively after her, rubbing his bruised ribs and completely missing her point.

Her voice came floating back up the hall, fading rapidly. "Of course," she said, "but now that I'm awake, I want something from the kitchens downstairs, anyway. Maybe if some sod hadn't woken me up, I wouldn't be hungry."

Arkantis rolled his eyes and followed her tirade faithfully downstairs, making sure to drag his feet the whole way. Via this mode of transportation, he arrived in the great, enclosed courtyard at the base of Ashaba just as the mysterious traveler pulled up to the tower gates. The archers on the wall were warily eying the dark, bulky shape that sat just outside the circle of light provided by the sputtering torches.

The bard peered through the rain, just able to make out a hunched figure, clad in a black robe, seated atop a two-wheeled wooden cart of the same sort that his mother might drive to visit the greengrocer. A single horse stood between the shafts, but there was something odd about it…

"Hail and well met, traveler!" Golden yelled through the gates, looking slightly ridiculous in her bedclothes. _No gatekeeper, no sentinel, no warden,_ thought Arkantis, _has ever worn a uniform like that._

"Sanctuary," the figure called back dryly. The voice, distorted by distance and the sounds of the weather, was oddly familiar.

The priestess had noticed it, too. Sure now that her hunch was right, she grinned and shouted, "_Every berk who's ever nicked a gully in a peel/Has heard the chant that Hardheads follow close upon their heel!_"

"_They get the rope and bang around in bondage to the Dead,_" the stranger sang back wearily, in a voice much better than Arkantis's own, "_But the Hardheads gave the Chord the rope and got the laugh instead._ Can I come in now, or shall I just push your tower over and press on?"

It was the way he said it—chillingly devoid of any jest, completely certain in the simple truth that it could be done, and easily—that had the guards on the wall looking edgily at one another and Arkantis leaping into the air, whooping with glee. The gates were opened, and the cart pulled inside, drawn by a horse out of a nightmare, but Golden ignored it, having seen much stranger things, and Arkantis didn't even notice, swarming up onto the cart to embrace the driver in a rough bear hug.

"Get off me, you daft malingerer!" the silvery voice cursed him.

"Cousin Sandro!" the bard squealed like a child. "You're home!"


	3. Quality Time

Golden Chord shook her head with a smile, sipping her tea and huddling further into her robe. It hadn't taken a quarter of an hour to put Sandro's…horse…away, wake one of the cooks, and find a corner for the three of them near a kitchen fireplace, where they could have an early breakfast and catch up. Now they were already in stitches as Arkantis regaled his cousin with the tales of his many mishaps and misadventures during his training, while the young necromancer smiled patiently and chuckled.

The bardic priestess had never known the mage that well, and knew little about him aside from his relationship to her apprentice and some stories about the travels of his parents. Aslenne and Zoltan were good people and stout adventurers—she had the word of Mourngrym Amcathra, himself, on that—but something didn't quite ring true about Sandro himself. It wasn't his profession that bothered her; Golden had been to too many places, seen too much, and known too many folks who were living exceptions to those rules that most people thought of as universal and unbreakable. She found it difficult to harbor any sort of prejudice toward someone she didn't know personally. An expert in people as much as in music, though, Golden could also spot a lie at a hundred paces—usually before someone opened their fool mouth. The necromancer hid it well, but he gave off the subtle feeling that there was something he wasn't telling you. It was nothing definite; just a sort of eerie prickling at the base of her skull. She could only pick up the faintest hints of it here and there—in his taut posture, the way the corners of his eyes tightened when someone said certain things, the hint of smoldering rage deep in the bowels of his otherwise pleasant voice. Just guesses, hunches; not enough to make her truly certain that she was right—which, of course, convinced her more than anything else that she _was_.

Suddenly, Sandro turned his head, his feline green eyes locking onto her tawny ones. His gaze held her, boring into her, and she felt, for all her power and experience, as weak as a kitten before those soul-spearing eyes. It was as if he read her thoughts, divined her musings, and judged her damned for even thinking to question that which she did not know.

Arkantis kept talking and laughing somewhere in the background, oblivious to the contest of wills that sizzled the air between necromancer and bard. The temperature in the room dropped steadily, until finally Golden Chord managed to wrench her gaze away from Sandro's. From the corner of her eye, she saw a movement in his face that might have been a smile, but she stared determinedly into the fire, frowning.

"You're not the same little boy I taught songs to in the common room of the Old Skull," she murmured. "I remember you at my knee, flame-furred little sprog that you were, as eager to learn as your foolish cousin. And look at you now."

"Or don't, if you prefer," he replied blandly. "We're never the same person twice, are we, planewalker?"

Now Golden did turn back, her eyes narrowed questioningly. The pale young necromancer had already shifted his eyes toward his still-babbling foster-brother, however, and ignored her steady scrutiny, so the bard-turned-priestess shook her head and let her mind drift to other matters.

It wasn't until Arkantis had repeated his question for the third time that she snapped back to reality. "What?" she said irritably, glancing over at the effervescent blond.

"I _said_, can I have leave to go back to Shadowdale with Sandro? He hasn't been home in a million tendays."

"What? Oh. Of course," his teacher responded absently. "It's just a skip to your case from here, so scamper, and I'll lann his nibs when he tumbles to the sudden silence. I've no doubt that he'll twig to a holiday for you as much as yourself."

Arkantis reeled under this barrage of extraplanar dialect, and Sandro gave him an odd look that was half distaste, half affection. Still, when the stunned bard finally recovered enough to thank his master, the mage shrugged philosophically. He glanced up as his cousin rose, stretching and yawning like he hadn't slept for a week.

"I'll go upstairs and pack," the lean young troubadour said, smiling sleepily, and patting Sandro affectionately on the shoulder, wandered away towards the upper floors.

"Take good care of him, spellslinger," Golden Chord's voice made him turn back to her. She was looking at him seriously, and he cocked his head to one side, raising a slender crimson eyebrow.

"I've put a lot of work into that barmy little rube," she continued. "He's got a long path to walk before he's as canny a spiv as yourself, but he'll miss the blinds more often than not if some blood'll guide him. Grant a tired old screed a favor, one cutter to another, and see that he doesn't wind up a deader."

"If you ladled that phony Cager accent any more thickly onto your words," Sandro replied sourly, "you'd be able to pick up your speech in a spoon." The comment had no malice behind it, though, and the necromancer smiled as he added, "I'll see that no harm comes to him, fear not. He _is_ my cousin, after all—although he seems more like a little brother sometimes."

"Funny; I thought he was older than you."

"There's a world of difference between age and maturity," the redhead chortled, "as, if I surmise correctly, you well know. Regardless, he'll be safe on the way home."

"I mostly meant later," Golden explained. "There's nothing to be afraid of out there in the dark, this close to Shadowdale."

"Yes there is," Sandro corrected her, standing to leave.

"Oh? What?"

He turned an unnaturally glittering eye on her, sending a shiver down her spine.

"Me," he replied, and went up to bed.

* * *

The next day dawned foggy, and the black clouds overhead seemed thicker than ever, although the rain was coming only in short spurts. Golden Chord, several other Harpers, and the Lord of Shadowdale himself, Mourngrym Amcathra, had gathered to see the pair off.

"Be sure to tell your parents to come and visit us," Amcathra reminded Sandro. "It's been a dog's age since I've seen either of them, and I've not been able to come to the Old Skull as often as I'd have liked in the past few years. We need to sit down and catch up."

"Get drunk, you mean," the necromancer replied dryly. "You know Mother will have no part of _that_. Besides, the last time you had too much ale, Jhaele threw you both out on the streets of Shadowdale to wander the night, and Vi scried you out two days later, still singing in the middle of a pile of dead gnolls halfway to Daggerdale."

The grizzled old warrior chuckled. "Those were good times, although I don't know if our wives _ever_ approved. Tell your father, at least, to come to Ashaba, and we'll rehash old adventures and maybe find some gnolls."

"I surely will," Sandro told him gravely. "And since I like you, I _won't_ tell Mother."

The Lord of Shadowdale roared with laughter, causing Arkantis's horse to roll its eyes wildly, although the battle-trained animal—a gift from Amcathra—managed not to rear and throw its errant rider, who was even then leaning down to embrace his teacher one last time.

"There's no telling how long you'll be gone," the priestess was saying, "so keep an edge on your fool brain-box, and do whatever your cousin tells you to do, you hear? I don't want to hear that you wound up a deader after all the sweat and tears I've lost over you."

"I'll practice while I'm away," Arkantis replied, smiling. "I promise!" He threw his hands up in mock defense against her stern and doubting glare.

"Everything?"

"Yes, _everything_." Arkantis rolled his eyes. "Although I swear I don't know where I'll find any locks to pick while I'm at home. Aunt Aslenne sticks every door and window in the house with magic."

"If you were good enough," Golden said archly, "that wouldn't matter. _But_," she held up her hand to stave off his protests, "you've plenty of time to get the dark of it, I expect. Just look you: Always keep your wits about you; always keep your dagger sharp; always keep a song in your fingers; and always—"

"—Remember that there are some situations you can only romance your way out of," her apprentice finished. "I know! You've told me a hundred thousand times."

"And it never seems to stick!" Golden scowled, slapping him harshly on the thigh. "Now go! Get! Before I change my mind!"

He grinned. "Right." Wheeling his horse, he started out of the yard, following the road north and east towards home. Sandro was already ahead of him, and he nudged his horse to a canter to catch up.

"You're never going to get home if you keep stopping every three yards to wave goodbye," Sandro called over his shoulder, not looking back.

Arkantis stopped his enthusiastic flailing and sat back down in his saddle, pouting. "You're so mean," he said sullenly, sticking his tongue out at his cousin's back.

"Don't do that," the young mage replied, still not turning around. "It's juvenile, and you're older than I am. It's time you started acting like it."

"You take all the fun out of life. If I act my age, then I have to do things old people do."

They rode in silence for a while, and the Twisted Tower faded in the distance behind them, as did the village of Ashaba. The rolling green hills of the Dalelands lay on either side of the muddy road, making the landscape look like a collection of sleeping giants, so long abed that the grass had grown over them. Arkantis imagined that he could hear them snoring.

"Sandro," he said finally, unable to stand the quiet any longer.

"You just can't abide silence, can you, cousin dearest?"

"What does 'glim' mean?" the bard continued, ignoring the redhead's acid tone.

"'S a new word. Means pretty. Usually excessively so."

"Then what does 'spurnarmor' mean?"

Sandro sighed tiredly. "A spurnarmor is someone who is very handsome or beautiful, and knows they are, and flaunts it by wearing no armor or concealing garments of any kind, so that they can be sure everyone else knows it, too."

"Oh." The pair rode on again for a few yards without speaking. "I wondered because—"

"Yes?" Sandro said a little too sweetly, twisting in his saddle.

"Only, Golden Chord always calls you a glim little spurnarmor when she talks about you." The blond sat back on his horse, crossing his hands on his pommel patiently.

A few seconds later, he was picking himself up out of a gorse bush, cursing. He sat up in the mud by the roadside, looking accusingly through the thin drizzle at his foster-brother.

"Sorry," Sandro said graciously. "Must have slipped."

Arkantis clambered to his feet ungracefully, and tottered over the other side of the road, inspecting the crater where the tree had been. He glanced doubtfully back to the necromancer.

His cousin shrugged. "It happens to the best of us. Shall we ride?" He clicked his reins suggestively.

"Excuse me," the bard muttered, somewhat subdued. "I have to go catch my horse."

* * *

It wasn't until they made camp that night, almost halfway between Ashaba and Shadowdale, that Arkantis was permitted a change of clothes. They had not ridden hard, spending most of the trip with the effusive young musician regaling his dour companions with tales of his mischief in the Twisted Tower. Sandro occasionally responded with a story of some humorous mishap or other that occurred during his apprenticeship to Ethric, but they were few and far between. They also, Arkantis noticed, featured the archmage exclusively as the butt of all their jokes.

Their campsite was nestled in a stand of oaks a few hundred yards off the road. Sandro sat on a rock there, tossing a handful of twigs into their small cooking fire, and sighed as the sound of bad singing echoed over the distant hills. The second member of the little party had discovered that he could shower effectively by repeatedly kicking and punching the rain-drenched trees, causing the droplets of water stored in their leaves to fall heavily onto him, and was wandering, naked, from tree to tree, using up his cousin's soap.

"_Will_ you stop that?" the necromancer finally snapped, angrily hurling a pebble into the crackling flames. "Every unwashed creature and highwayman in the Dalelands can probably hear you! Besides, your singing is terrible. I thought you were training to get better at it; I thought that was your _job_."

"I am!" Arkantis said defensively, meandering back into the light of the fire. "It is! I'm just better at instruments, you know that; I can play over a dozen different ones."

"Put some clothes on, for Sune's sake! And stop bragging."

"Well, stop teasing me." He caught the rough towel the slender spellcaster hurled at him and began to vigorously dry himself. "And why would Sune care if I'm naked, anyway? I thought that was what she was goddess of, or something."

"She isn't, no," Sandro told him firmly, "and she probably doesn't in any case. _I_, however, _do_. So dress."

The blond young man stood up to his full height, puffing out his chest, and put his fists on his hips, the towel dangling. "You run around almost naked all the time!" he argued, indicating his cousin's outfit, which consisted of a pair of pearl-gray leather breeches, some jewelry, and very little else. The almost-not-there vest that left his midriff bare served to cover him almost as effectively as the golden ring around his bicep and the ruby choker at his throat.

In response, the wizard rose, meeting his cousin's defiant gaze with stern green eyes. He was an inch taller than Arkantis in any case, and with Sandro still in his boots and the bard barefooted, he was able to look slightly down at him.

"Almost naked," he explained in a tone that brooked no argument, "is not skyclad, and at least I have something to show when I do. If you want to eat, put on your clothes, and save it for some terribly unlucky tavern wench somewhere. The stew is almost ready." So saying, he caught up the ladle from the small iron pot he had hung over the fire on a makeshift spit, and began to stir the little cauldron's bubbling contents unconcernedly.

Sulking, Arkantis turned to get his pack from his tethered horse, tying the towel around his slender waist like a kilt. Unobservant in any case, he failed, in his distraction, to hear the woman coming up behind him until he felt the point of the dagger in the back of his neck.

"Well," a female voice breathed huskily in his ear as he froze. "What do we have here?"

"Uh, Sandro…" the young man said nervously, one arm still outstretched halfway toward his saddlebags.

"I know," the redhead replied nonchalantly. "I'm impressed you can hold that position, with your notorious lack of balance. You look ridiculous. You should probably let him sit down, miss; he'll fall eventually, if you don't."

"That's possible," the unseen woman conceded. Arkantis felt the pain disappear from the base of his skull, and he was swung around roughly from behind, coming face-to-face with a lean female human a few inches shorter than himself. She had tight-fitting black clothing on that seemed to hug her body in all the right places, and her dark, glittering eyes matched the unruly mass of curls that fell over her shoulders. Suddenly acutely conscious of his state of undress, the bard blushed, coloring almost to his navel—a fact that the mystery woman chuckled at. She grinned at him, and somehow managing to make the action seem almost malicious, looked him slowly and deliberately up and down.

"Nice towel," she told him wolfishly, laughing coarsely when his blush deepened.

In the meantime, Sandro was cautiously putting the ladle back in the pot. Watching the ensuing mischief, he pursed his lips disapprovingly and shook his head at his cousin's predicament. "Was there something specific you wanted," he asked pointedly, "or were you just going to try and kill us both before you rifled through our packs?" He put no particular emphasis on the word _try_.

The woman glowered at the interruption, then whistled shrilly and motioned at something to Sandro's right with her free hand, the other keeping the dagger level with Arkantis's exposed chest.

A rangy man stepped out of the shadows near the mage, holding a large crossbow aimed at Sandro's head. He looked about the same age as his compatriot, with shoulder-length black hair and a shaggy little goatee on his chin. Unlike the woman, however, he was wearing businesslike leather armor studded with steel rivets, and he showed no signs of attempting to flirt.

"Wonderful," Sandro said sarcastically. "Two of you."

"We _were_ thinking about just killing you and taking your things," the woman explained, "but we've been running from guardsmen since Scardale and your little campsite here just seems so inviting that we might stay awhile. You might even get something out of it, if you're really nice to me," she added suggestively. Arkantis gaped at her until she said, as an afterthought, "After you've been staked down, of course, or tied against a tree trunk." His jaw snapped shut. "Your clothes will make fine disguises," she continued, "since no one will ever think to look for such a pair of popinjays as we'll seem in those outfits." She eyed Sandro thoughtfully. "Although I think I'd probably fit in the redhead's clothing better, don't you, Shawm?"

"Too skinny for me, Karine," the man with the crossbow replied. "All that tight leather probably wouldn't stretch enough to cover me."

"Hey!" Sandro protested. "I'm right here!"

"His hips are too slim, as well," Karine agreed. "What about the blond? He's almost as slender, but not quite; I think his waist is a couple of inches bigger."

"How much do you think he weighs?"

"Probably ten or fifteen pounds more than the pale one. His shoulders are broader, although both of them look like they've got plenty of muscle on them. That one's trim as a panther, though, and this one's a bit softer; his clothes will probably be baggier."

"What are you going to do?" Arkantis finally stuttered.

"Do?" Karine answered sweetly. "Why, I'm going to strip you both stark naked, rope your wrists and ankles to tent stakes, and pin you, spread-eagled, to the ground over there in that little clearing. And then I'm going to eat your stew while Shawm here has his way with both of you, until we're ready to leave."

"_What_?" Sandro hissed.

"Oh, he hasn't even seen another woman besides me in weeks, have you Shawm? It's been so long, he'd probably bed anything, and it's not like he hasn't done it before." The dark-haired bandit took the ladle with her empty hand and tasted the boiling stew carefully. "Not bad."

"Why don't you just bed each _other_?" Sandro asked plaintively.

"Because we're brother and sister," Karine replied. "That would be a little too exotic for me, although Shawm there will try anything once. Won't you?"

The man growled in response, a lupine noise that Sandro, while he found it almost halfway attractive, had no time for. Rolling his eyes, he narrowed his eyes, calling up the patterns of energy stored in the front of his brain. They burned in his mind's eye like candyfloss latticework spun in glowing greens and oranges and whites, and he mentally flipped through them like pages in a book, reviewing each and finally settling on one.

In the interim, Karine had backed Arkantis up next to Sandro, so that both young men were standing side by side, and had taken the crossbow from Shawm with a look of amusement, holding it steadily aimed at them both. Her brother was already disrobing in preparation for the fantasies he intended to act out very shortly, shrugging off his hauberk and the tunic underneath to display a rippling torso, with a fine trail of black fuzz running from his navel to disappear under his belt.

"You have to understand," Sandro said seriously, "that any other time, I'd almost consider letting you try it. Right now, though…" He smiled apologetically at Shawm, who had paused in the act of unbuckling his thick leather belt. "I'm hungry." His hands flashed up, already twisted in the gestures of an arcane spell, and he spat a short, sharp phrase in the language his startled cousin recognized as Draconic.

Karine screamed as a hair-thin beam of crimson light speared through her, lifting her upwards and flinging her back through the air in a result completely disproportionate to the seemingly minor effect of the spell. She bounced off a tree trunk some five yards away with a sharp _crack_, and her cries stopped abruptly.

Before Shawm could even react, Sandro was sliding his toe under the handle of his razor-sharp scythe, which lay on the ground near the fire, easily at hand. He flicked his foot, hurling the weapon into the air, and grasped it at waist level with both hands. Even as the half-naked man went for the short sword at his waist, the necromancer had dropped into a crouch, whirling twice as he ducked: Once to buckle Arkantis's knees with the back of the smooth shaft, sending the bard, flailing, to the ground, and again as he passed the curved blade a shadow's depth over his careening cousin's nose, hooking it behind Shawm's legs and jerking forward.

There was a meaty sound as the severed ends of the robber's hamstrings slithered away in two different directions. The man squealed like a pig and clutched at the backs of his knees, toppling backward. Sandro, like a pouncing cat, was atop him, one foot planted firmly on his stricken foe's naked chest and the blunt outer edge of the scythe's blade pressed against his throat, choking him, cutting off his shrieks. As his struggles weakened somewhat, Sandro dropped down to straddle the bandit, transferring his hold so that the slick shaft of the polearm was cutting off circulation instead of the business end.

"It's too bad for you, Shawm," he whispered pleasantly into the feebly sobbing highwayman's face. He ground his body into the thighs of the man beneath him for emphasis. "You'll never know what you missed, I guess. Your loss, like so many before you. Remember me when you get to the Prison Plane."

Straightening, he twisted the shaft of the scythe against Shawm's jaw; there was a popping sound, and the man went limp. Sandro rose to his feet slowly, dusting his breeches off, and turned to find his cousin standing unsteadily, hanging onto his towel as though by clinging tightly enough, he could stop the whole world slipping away.

"Don't worry," he said dismissively, sweeping his scythe through the fire to clean it and noting sourly that his stew had boiled over; now he would have to scour the pot. "I made sure not to cut their bellies open, so they won't start to stink until tomorrow or the day after. At least," he added, wrinkling his nose as he sniffed himself, "not any more than they do already. They smelled like gnolls, didn't they?" When no reply was forthcoming, he cocked his head to one side, taking in the young bard's glistening eyes and trembling lower lip.

His features softened. "Ah," he said sadly. "You've…never seen anyone killed before, have you?" Numbly, Arkantis shook his head, and Sandro sighed, realizing that the real problem: Arkantis had never seen _him_ kill anybody.

Putting a fraternal arm around his shoulders so that the shaking musician could lay his head on his cousin's shoulder, the necromancer stroked his cousin's hair awkwardly. "It's all right," he murmured. "Come on; you can sleep in the cart. Dress tomorrow. I'll get the pot and tie your horse to the back of the cart. We'll find another camp somewhere else." With a little urging, the subdued bard did as he was told, and Sandro clicked his tongue, sending his skeletal horse trotting up the road toward the next stand of trees.

When Arkantis wasn't looking, he dragged the bodies of the two dead thieves over to the fire, and threw them across it to put out the flames. As the smell of charring flesh filled the night, the young necromancer glided silently out of the grove, disappearing into the shadows after his stricken cousin.


	4. Shadowdale

Arkantis was still subdued when they rode into Shadowdale, but he could not remain so for long; his naturally buoyant nature, combined with the prospect of seeing his family, served to lift his spirits to the point where he would at least _talk_ to Sandro, to whom he had not said a word since the episode out on the road.

"Do you think Mother and Auntie Aslenne will be surprised to see us?" he couldn't help asking.

Sandro glanced over at the bard, raising his eyebrows slightly in mild astonishment. Although he would simply have _died_ before ever admitting it, especially to his frothy foster-brother, he was actually starting to grow concerned over the young bard's melancholy silence, which had been so contrary to his typical behavior. For the first few hours, he had modified his initial suspicions, assuming that it was anger toward the way in which Sandro had so abruptly dispatched their assailants, since the necromancer knew that Arkantis would rather have frightened them off or sent them running rather than kill them. As the miles slid by, however, it had become rapidly apparent that his cousin was disturbed by more than just the outcome of their little skirmish.

In truth, Arkantis's depression stemmed more from Sandro's first guess than he could have known. No stranger to battle—or, at least, to combat training, something that Golden Chord had _insisted_ was essential for the survival of any adventuring bard—Arkantis would readily have taken part in the fight, given a chance. It was more the look in his cousin's eyes than anything else: The unconscious way that the corners of his mouth had curled slightly up, turning his expression into a tight, feral grin at the prospect of the kill. The dilation of his pupils in the instant of each death, the flush of his pale skin, the fine sheen of cold sweat, like he had just been abed with some young lass.

He had enjoyed it.

He had _wanted_ to kill those two highwaymen. He had already had the way he would do it drawn out in his mind as soon as he sensed their approach. And, most frightening of all, Sandro's actions had been so quick, so fluid, like they were thoughtless; how many had he killed?

Would he have killed Arkantis if the bard had tried to stop him?

The notion haunted the usually cheery musician. If he had tried to stop Sandro… The mental image of those fiery green eyes turned on him, of the dripping scythe upraised, the flicker of arcane fire along the necromancer's fingers as he smiled that chilly, predatory smile…

What had happened to the little redheaded boy of the past? Only during the heat of the battle, short as it had been, had Arkantis finally seen what had shaken Golden Chord in the instant she had lain eyes on him. It was not the aura of power that surrounded him—all wizards carried themselves with confidence, with that tangible crackle of magic surrounding them, and Sandro had always been as arrogant as he was talented, anyway. It was not the feline grace of his movements, as much like a trained assassin as a trained dancer—his father had schooled him in the martial arts just as his mother had schooled him in the Arts Magical.

It was the soulless way he looked at everyone now, the emptiness in those eyes, holes filled only with the cold green flame of his magic. It was the nearly palpable feeling that he was only barely restraining himself from killing you, right now, in front of everybody.

He didn't _care_ anymore.

Where had Sandro gone? Arkantis wondered what must have happened to him during his apprenticeship in the Shadow Gap, that he was such a different person now. His terse answers, his sarcastic sense of humor, his near-fatal vanity, his disgustingly regal attitude—those had always been Sandro. But this person, the one riding in the cart now, beside him, staring out from beneath the artfully tousled red hair that must have taken him an hour to get right—this was not Sandro the cousin, Sandro the foster-brother, Sandro the bookworm, Sandro the warrior.

This was Sandro the necromancer, and Arkantis wasn't sure that he liked him.

"What?" the bard said, aware that the mage had spoken to him.

"I _said_," Sandro replied irritably, "I sincerely doubt it, since Vi has probably been watching us ride in since this morning. In fact, I told her we were coming."

"Oh. I always forget wizards can do that."

"Actually, I didn't use any magic; I sent Hugin on ahead with the message. Bards can cast the spell you're thinking of, though, just as easily as mages; I can show you sometime."

Arkantis smiled, and although his fears were not _completely_ allayed, it was only partially hollow. "I'd like that."

It was only a few minutes before the Old Skull and Elminster's tower rose into view. Just behind their hill, in a quiet part of town with wide, empty streets flanked by tall, ancient oaks, lay the Ironreach residence, a modest single-story home built from dark-stained timbers and white-washed brick walls. Shielded by a barricade of pear trees enshrouded in rose vines of astounding size—and with astounding thorns, thanks to the magic of a few potions purchased from a helpful druid friend of his mother's—Sandro's house was nearly invisible from the road, but the big, white rose arbor they used for a gate allowed them passage into the little courtyard.

As he pulled his skeletal steed and cart onto the side of the front path, a bobbing sphere of wispy, golden light hovered up to him, its presence warm against his face.

—_You're back, you're back!_— its high, breathy voice, like the sound of a silver chime, rang in his mind.

"Glimmer!" Arkantis crowed, dismounting from his own horse. He dropped the reins carelessly, and the beast immediately began eying the freshly-scythed, emerald green grass of the Ironreach lawn, its mouth visibly watering.

—_Arkantis, too?_— The lantern archon's telepathic voice was confused, but pleased. —_You have also returned?_—

"Once Sandro showed up at the Tower, they couldn't keep me away," the bard grinned at his aunt's familiar.

"What a shame," another vice said from the doorway. "Here we thought we'd only have Big Brother's snide remarks to put up with, and now he has to compete with your caterwauling. What _ever_ will we do?"

The words had no bite to them, though, and Arkantis whirled instantly, sweeping up the raven-haired beauty who glided from the open doorway towards them. Sandro's sister squealed as the bard grabbed her, but she was chuckling when he set her down, huffing with effort.

"Vidomina," Sandro smiled when she turned to him.

"Big Brother," she responded solemnly. Then she threw her arms around his neck, plastering his face with a shower of exuberant little kisses. Actually laughing, the necromancer threw up his hands in mock defense, and his sister victoriously spun on Arkantis, administering the same treatment. She was tall for a woman, almost as tall as her sibling, and her skin was smooth and white as any noblewoman's. Though she was pleasingly slender, her face was faintly heart-shaped and softly attractive, with naturally red lips and large blue eyes that continually sparkled with mirth. She was easily as beautiful as Sandro was handsome, but subtly more attractive, because she had none of the smug self-satisfaction her brother exuded like a cloud with regard to his appearance.

When her affection had been administered to her satisfaction, she assumed a haughty expression and drew her dignity around her. "Mother and father are in the garden," she told them airily. "If you would please follow me." She floated silently away again, Glimmer dancing along behind her.

Grinning like a couple of schoolboys, Sandro and Arkantis gathered their things and trailed her into the house. _Just now_, the bard thought, _he almost looks like the old Sandro_.

Their bedrooms had been kept in good order for them while they had been gone for their respective apprenticeships, and the two young men each deposited their personal effects in their chambers—Sandro placing his chest and satchel carefully at the foot of the bed, and Arkantis indifferently tossing his heavy backpack on the floor in a corner. The main hall led straight through the house from the front door to the back, and down this they hurried to enter the garden where their family awaited them.

The garden was not large—as long as the house was wide, but only about fifteen feet from the house to the roses—and was divided in two by the small stone-flagged square onto which one stepped when leaving from the back door. At each corner of the stones stood a white wooden trellis covered with red and pink roses in full bloom, each of which was a corner post for a domed arbor roof, also shrouded in flowering vines. There were a few sturdy wooden chairs under the arbor, a small table, and a man and woman of vastly differing appearance.

Aslenne was Sandro's mother—Arkantis's maternal aunt—but he looked nothing like her, except for his eyes. She had the same jade-green eyes, like those from a dragon with scales the same shade. Her hair, however, was long and black, like her daughter's, and despite being a mage and a bibliophile, she had also been an adventurer once and remained an outdoorsy sort, with the kind of golden tan that rich people pay large sums to fake. She was of a height with Vidomina and nearly of a build with her husband, but the soft blue gown and robe she wore concealed the taut muscle of her frame. It could not, however, hide the surety in her step; here was a woman who was as much a warrior as a wizard, and no mistake.

Zoltan, by contrast, looked nearly identical to his son and, conversely, very little like his younger child. His shoulder-length hair was blood-red and pulled back into a shaggy, untidy queue, and his skin remained incongruously pale in the face of years as a hardened traveler and slayer of monsters most foul. His lean body was whiplike, almost as slender as that of his wife, and it was easy to tell from which parent both Sandro and Vidomina had inherited their narrow waists and long legs. It was impossible to tell, however, whether or not his daughter sported his eyes, for his own were smooth and blank as ice, unblemished by pupil or iris. Their whiteness shone eerily in the midday sun that filtered down through the leaves of the arbor.

Both rose to greet the pair that came into the garden, Aslenne rushing to envelope first her son, then her nephew in a crushing embrace, and Zoltan merely clapping a hand on either boy's shoulder in wordless greeting. A pair of ravens rustled in the trellises, and one of the sleek black avians gave a raucous _caw_ of greeting.

"And a good day to you, as well, Munin," Sandro replied, ruffling the bird's feathers. His sister's familiar fluttered its wings in indignation, but suffered the pat as its counterpart chuckled in creepily human tones.

"It's so good to see you both," Aslenne smiled, drying her eyes as Sandro and Arkantis settled themselves into two empty chairs, "especially together! We expected you home because it was nearing time for your apprenticeship to end, anyway," she added to Sandro, "but it's a surprise to find dear little Ark with you."

Dear little Ark rolled his eyes, but Sandro laughed. "Golden Chord and old Mourngrym foisted him off on me as I went through Ashaba," he offered by way of explanation. "They said they didn't want him anymore."

"I had run out of jokes," Arkantis retorted good-naturedly. "You've been away for quite a while."

When the chuckles died down, Zoltan spoke, not turning his head toward his son. "We were surprised not to receive word from Master Ethric," he rumbled in his surprisingly deep voice. "We thought he would at least have had the courtesy to send us some kind of message, telling us you were a full-fledged wizard now."

"I had already told him that Hugin was flying home with the news," the necromancer lied easily, indicating the leftmost raven perched in the arbor. "When I added that I wanted to surprise you, at least a little, he agreed not to send ahead."

"How did everything go?" Aslenne inquired. "It's been a long time since we last had word, and I know that Ethric can be a hard taskmaster."

"We had our disagreements," Sandro told her smoothly, "mostly over the subject of necrotic divination, but I convinced him that if I was getting lessons from more than one master, things would go faster."

"So you finally came down on necromancy?" His mother nodded in satisfaction. "I've always said that it's the second-most useful school in the Art. First, I suppose, if you're specializing. I never could make a decision when I was studying under Ethric's previous apprentice, my master Randal, and so I went in for versatility instead. I know you typically elect to forego some other studies when you do that, though. Please tell me you didn't skimp on scrying magicks."

"Of course not," Sandro snorted indignantly. "Then Vidomina and I would have nothing to talk about. I just skipped the sections on enchantments and charms in the books that he gave me. I figured I didn't need it, anyway." He tossed his head mockingly, tumbling his short hair prettily about.

"I know you and books," Aslenne said critically, "but I also know you and lessons. You're a self-learner, not a good student like your sister, or I would have trained you myself. What else did you leave out?"

"What are you implying?" he grinned impishly.

"Oh, give."

Sandro stuck out his tongue in distaste. "Figments. Phantasmal magic. Patterns. Parlor tricks, mostly. I never did have the knack for illusions, you know that."

"We're in the same boat, there, then," Vidomina giggled. "You remember when Mother tried to teach us how to turn invisible?"

"What a disaster!" Sandro moaned in horrified recollection. "Disembodied arms and heads bobbing about, holes in hands, first one eye missing and then the other. I positively cannot _stand_ illusions."

"They're not that bad," his mother admonished. She turned to Zoltan. "Remember that time we fought that stone giant up in the mountains of Cormyr, dear, and you led it along that ravine, and I had conjured an image to cover up the edge of the cliff and make it look like the plateau ran on, and the foolish lummox trundled along right after you and tumbled headfirst off the precipice?"

"I never knew you fought giants!" Arkantis exclaimed, looking like a child surprised with a new toy.

"Oh, many times," said Zoltan, still apparently staring off into space. "Many, many times. We even met one of the fabled purple dragons that haunt the deepest regions of the Forest Kingdom, not too long after that incident."

"Really? You never told us that story!"

"Indeed? Well, we had just come down from the mountains, actually, and we were planning to return to Suzail to restock our supplies. Your aunt's spells were running low because we hadn't had a decent chance to camp for two days, and wouldn't you know it, the first thing we saw when we hit the tree line was a pack of worgs. Well, we weren't about to go down without a fight, I can tell you! So she drew her sword, and I drew mine, and it became a kind of contest, with her yelling 'Three!' and me calling 'Five!' back through the trees, and then she'd cry 'Seven!' and I'd have to hurry to catch up because we were running out of worgs pretty fast…"

* * *

They talked long into the evening, when the sun was setting beyond the barrier of the roses and pears and the garden was lit only by the cheerful light of Aslenne's familiar, only pausing in their merriment when Sandro went inside to help his mother and sister prepare a brief, cold supper. Around mouthfuls of the previous night's roast fowl, Arkantis managed to comment on the fact that he had always thought it odd that all the wizards he knew were such excellent cooks.

"Of course!" Aslenne told him as both her children laughed uproariously. "Don't you think that, with all the combining of ingredients and reagents and following precise recipes to create trinkets and spells, that we eventually learn _something_ useful?"

The young bard admitted that he had never really thought of it like that, to which Zoltan growled, "Mages make the best beer, too—it comes from brewing potions," and they all laughed again.

By the time the stars had begun to twinkle in the blue velvet sky, the little family was nearly exhausted from the effulgence they all felt. So it was that they all jumped when the shutting of the front door echoed through the house. "Heya!" a voice called down the corridor. "I'm home! Len?"

"In the garden, Ann!" Aslenne called back. She lifted a finger to her lips when Arkantis started to rise, and whispered, "Shh! We haven't told her yet! We got Sandro's message while she was working at the Skull, so she thinks she's coming home to a nearly empty house." The light of mischief dancing in her viridian eyes, she began to weave her hands in front of her nephew, speaking in a low but sonorous voice that grew progressively more choral and distorted as she recited her incantation, the signature sound of a wizard at work if ever Arkantis had heard it.

"Are you doing what I _think_ you're doing, love?" Zoltan said, cocking his head reproachfully to one side.

"I don't recognize the incantation," Vidomina said, frowning prettily. Sandro echoed her admission, and Zoltan snorted.

"Neither of you would," the old warrior grunted. "If I've heard that spell once then I've heard it a thousand times; she's throwing a glamer over him."

"Oh, Mother!" Vidomina chided, putting her fists on her hips. "Really!"

Then Aslenne finished her chant, concluding the accompanying gestures with a jaunty little flourish. Arkantis felt a heavy pressure on the back of his neck for an instant, and his scalp tingled the way it did whenever he was around magic. Then the moment passed, and he heard Sandro say, "Mother, really!"

He started to ask her precisely what she had made him look like, but she shushed him immediately. "Don't speak!" she ordered.

The back door opened, and Arkantis's mother, Annah, stepped out onto the flagstones. "Heya!" she repeated cheerily. "You won't guess who was just at the Skull! There was a bloody great horse standing outside calling for ale, and of course you know that we get all types down there, but a _unicorn_, I mean, really!" The words came out in a nonstop flow; that was the way she had always spoken. "He had an elven lady with him, and our very own—oh! Sandro! When did _you_ get home?" She hurried to embrace him as he stood, smiling.

"Hello, Aunt Annah."

"Hello, yourself! And my own sister never spoke a word to me about your being here! When did you—oh, my! My Lord Elminster, as well!" She bobbed a hurried curtsy as Aslenne snorted into the teacup she had hastily raised to conceal her broadening grin.

Arkantis's eyes opened wide in surprise for an instant, and it took him several moments to make the connection. When realization dawned, he affected a good-natured scowl and nodded regally to his mother, saying nothing.

"How nice to have guests! And it's good to see you, nephew dearest, truly. I wish I had known you were…" She trailed off, raising her face as though to sniff the wind. "I feel magic. Len, have you been casting?" Annah had always been close to the Weave, and but for her poor health—the weak constitution that Arkantis had inherited—she could probably have been as skilled a wizard as her older sister.

Aslenne managed to shake her head in a negative, but was unable to reply because she had just found something extremely interesting at the bottom of her teacup, something which was conveniently engrossing her entire attention.

"Sandro?" Annah arched an eyebrow disapprovingly. "Vi? No? Lord Elm—_eek_!" In the moment that her sibling had turned to face Sandro, Aslenne had dismissed her illusion, and now Annah could see her son clearly, nearly fainting from the shock. She recovered enough to hug him close, kissing him soundly on the forehead, before she rounded on her sister, who was laughing openly now. "For shame, Len! You might have put an end to me, for Mystra's sake! You know how well I handle surprises."

"It's good to see you, too, Mother," Arkantis smiled, rising to give her a proper embrace. "How have you been?"

"Better than last month; those new herb simples that Belle and Furalith stirred up for me are working wonders. I do hope you've been using yours, as well." Her son nodded, and she fussed with his hair, his long bangs having come undone from his waist-length golden braid in the excitement. "Speaking of our resident healers, are you all back for some common reason? It's a bit unusual, although not at all unpleasant, that you'd every one get home at the same time."

"What do you mean, 'every one?'" Sandro asked curiously.

"Oh, didn't I mention?" Annah said over her shoulder. "That's who I was talking about being at the tavern tonight."

"You mean—" Arkantis started.

"Yes," his mother replied, hooking a few stray strands over his ear. "Trendal is back in Shadowdale, too."


	5. Like Old Times

It was almost all that Sandro and Arkantis—especially Arkantis—could do to stop themselves from rushing straight to the Old Skull tavern to meet their friend. Only an admonition from the bard's tiny blond mother kept them at home that night.

"If _you_ didn't know that _he_ was here in Shadowdale," she said, "then _he_ probably doesn't know that _you_ are, either. Besides, he seemed tired; he left for home right before I did, so he's most likely already abed. Just wait until tomorrow."

"Fine," her son agreed petulantly.

Sandro yawned and stretched languorously, scratching the back of his head. "I wonder if his return is at all significant."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I've finished my apprenticeship, and Golden Chord as much as said that you'd essentially completed your own training; she seems to think that most of a bard's experience should come from the road, or whatever. So, I was wondering if—just coincidentally—this means that Ren is home for good, as well."

"That would be nice," Arkantis smiled sleepily. "We could all go on our own adventure together, just the three of us. We could really make something of ourselves!"

Sandro blinked. "What?"

"Just think!" The bard sat up, growing excited once more. "We have Auntie Aslenne's and Uncle Zoltan's experiences to guide us, and each of us has something to contribute—you can cast all kinds of spells, you could do just about anything; Trendal grew up in a healer's house, and he knows everything there is to know about medicine and healing, magical and mundane alike; and I can even manage a few spells myself, here and there, not to mention what I can do with my music."

"What precisely _can_ you do with your music?" Sandro asked, only half sarcastically.

Arkantis shrugged. "Golden Chord showed me how to use the music to attract people's attention—make them watch me more closely, so they don't pay any mind to anything else that's going on around them. She said that, with practice, a lot of Harpers and other musicians learn how to charm their audience into making them do whatever they want them to. I haven't quite got the hang of it, myself, but they say that practice makes perfect…"

Sandro shook his head, smiling. "I don't know. I already have plans to visit a few places and continue my education—Silverymoon, Waterdeep, maybe the colleges in Halruaa and the Wizard's Reach or in Aglarond. I'm not sure if I could look out for you two on the road at the same time I was trying to study."

"Oh, piffle!" his cousin snorted. "We could take care of ourselves! Golden Chord showed me how to use all kinds of weapons. I'm pretty good with a longbow, and you know that Trendal can use a sword, because Uncle Zoltan taught him."

"I taught him how to use a _scimitar_," Sandro's father corrected him. "There's a lot of difference between using a scimitar and a longsword, just like there is between a longsword and a hand-and-a-half blade. Just ask your aunt." He jabbed a thumb at his wife, who nodded.

"I haven't the faintest clue how you would use a longsword," she admitted. "I imagine it's somewhat similar to a bastard sword, but with the blade so much shorter, you'd have to account for the weight and the balance and—well, I don't think I could do it, honestly."

"Regardless," Arkantis continued airily, "I'm certain that Ren is capable of defending himself, if not with steel then with magic. All of his training was to become a druid, wasn't it? So he could…talk to trees, or something. Anyway, Sandro and I could protect him even if he couldn't, and he could just tend our wounds."

"I'm just as much a healer as Trendal is," Sandro said sourly. "He probably knows more about bandages and herbs, but I'd say we're about even when it comes to infusions and poultices, and I know more about bones and organs than he ever will."

"What possible reason could you have to know about bones and organs?" Vidomina asked distastefully.

"Necromancer, dearest little sister, remember? A large part of my education was spent in graveyards on dark and stormy nights."

"Oh, posh." The young diviner stuck her tongue out at the insolently grinning redhead. "I may not know as much as you do about necrogenetic reanimation, but I know enough to know that you don't have to be a master embalmer or chirurgeon to work the spells, even at the lowest levels."

"Necrogenesis and chirurgy have nothing to do with one another, Vi. If I was planning to reanimate a shambling mass of decaying animal matter to carry my luggage, then I daresay that the last thing I'd spend time on would be cosmetic enhancement, magical or otherwise. If I'd wanted _pretty_ post-mortem, I would have worked harder on my glamers. My studies into surgery and alchemy are more focused on long-term maintenance of the dearly departed."

Arkantis raised a hand weakly as his head reeled under the barrage of arcane technical terms. "Excuse me," he managed, "but could someone tell me what 'new-crow-djinni-sass' means?"

"Raising the undead," everyone else responded simultaneously.

"Oh. Thank you."

"Sandro," Vidomina said, returning to the main thread of the conversation, "there _is_ no long term maintenance on an undead creature. Part of the spell that reanimates the corpse is the convective flow of negative energy that renews both the mobilizing force _and_ the structural integrity. I'm no necromancer, Big Brother, but even _I_ can galvanize a corpse, and I know that you don't have to carry preservatives and scalpels around to foment their upkeep."

"I'm not thinking about what they _need_, Vi," Sandro replied somewhat distantly. He had a faraway look in his eyes. "I'm thinking about what they _want_."

"They don't want anything. They're dead."

"Not all of them. Help me out, Mother; you've run across free-willed, sentient undead."

Aslenne started counting off on her fingers. "Liches, death knights, dracoliches," she listed, "atropal scions—nasty things—eyes of fear and flame, demiliches, baelnorns—that's another kind of lich—mummies, sometimes. There are a few, but not many."

"But what if there were? Could you imagine it—the undead working and playing alongside the living in big cosmopolitan places like the Silver Marches and the City of Splendors?"

"What are you talking about, son?" Zoltan asked curiously.

"I found a spell," Sandro replied, "a very old one that isn't used much anymore. It's designed to awaken the minds of non-sentient undead creatures, like zombies, and give them intelligence and personality. It turns them back into people, with needs and fears and desires—real people."

Aslenne considered this carefully. "It's an unusual idea," she conceded uncertainly.

"It's weird, is what it is," Annah muttered. "Why would you want to give free will and intelligent thought to creatures born of utter evil?"

"They're not all evil," Sandro protested immediately. "Everyone assumes that because most undead beings are animated and manipulated by evil wizards and by clerics of gods like Bane and Velsharoon. That doesn't make them inherently evil. Now, I freely admit—" He held up a hand to forestall any forthcoming protests. "I freely admit that many of them _are_; most of the wizards that prolong their lives through lichdom are the blackest and most vile of individuals, but they're that way already—the changeover doesn't force it on them. And there are good undead! What was it you said, Mother? Baelnorns! Baelnorns are elven liches who exist solely to protect and guide their families and homelands. I've never heard of or read about an evil baelnorn."

"I don't think there are any," Vidomina allowed, somewhat reluctantly. "I think their ascension to that state has to be approved by the elven gods."

"Ah-ha!" Sandro pounced on the remark triumphantly. "And listen to yourself! You even called it 'ascension,' just now. That implies goodness, right? A higher path? So why would all of the lesser undead have to be evil by definition? They're tools, essentially, just like a saw or a hammer—or a golem. If a golem pounds somebody, who does everyone blame? The mage who built it, not the construct itself. A golem has no more control over its actions than a sword, and nobody assumes that all swords are evil just because they're used to kill people. The same benefit of the doubt should be extended to the undead."

"You make a compelling case, anyway," Vidomina said grudgingly. "You almost make me feel like I'm being unfair when I typify them, now."

"That's my goal," Sandro smiled, settling back in his chair. "I want there to be a place, someday, where the living and the goodly, self-aware undead can live and work together toward a mutual goal. I'm going to write a book about it, one day."

"I think it's a worthwhile idea, if strange," his mother told him. "A place like that could be interesting, to be sure. And necromancers would always be in demand amongst the undead, the same way that healers and priests are sought out by the living now. You could turn necromancy back into a respectable profession."

"I'd like to."

"Well, enough of that for now," Zoltan cut in. "As diverting a discussion as this is, I'm for bed; I don't think I could stay awake another minute if I had to. We can talk more about it tomorrow, and you two can go hunt Trendal down and have your reunion."

He stood abruptly and helped Aslenne collect the dishes while Annah and Vidomina wandered inside. Hugin and Munin were already asleep, nestled together in the arbor above, and Glimmer trailed, bobbing and glowing, after Sandro and Arkantis as they made their way into the house.

The family said their goodnights and scattered slowly to their respective beds. From his own room, Arkantis listened as the sound of indoor plumbing and the creaking of the reservoir built into the roof told him that Sandro was bathing in the lavatory across the hall. He unbound his long hair, stripped, and slid blissfully between the saffron satin sheets of his bed, a blessing after even a couple of nights on the road and comfortable even in comparison to the decent feather beds of the Twisted Tower.

He lay awake for a long time, thinking about the past few days. He was certainly glad to see everyone again, although he was still adjusting to Sandro's new and apparently more malignant persona. They could see Trendal tomorrow, too, and maybe even meet his companions; his mother had said that there had been a unicorn and an elf at the Old Skull with Ren earlier in the evening.

The bard tried to picture each member of his family in his mind: His gentle mother was probably already asleep after an afternoon of working the bar in a rowdy Dalelands watering hole. Zoltan would probably already be snoring his thunderous snore, and Aslenne, impervious, would be sitting propped up against her pillow, browsing through one of her spellbooks or a new novel from Waterdeep by Glimmer's warm, golden-white glow. Vidomina would be checking her crystals one last time to monitor the surrounding countryside and the Ironreach grounds, as was the young diviner's habit. That was why Shadowdale had never fallen to invaders, Arkantis mused—every adventurer in Faerûn seemed to retire here, and they were all professionals; more than that, they raised their _children_ to be professionals. _With people like Vi and Sandro around_, he thought, _I pity any dragon or dark elf that comes calling_. Either deliberately or subconsciously, he modestly never included himself in the numbers of those capable of coming to the town's defense.

When the squeak of pipes and the echoing gurgle of the drain told him that Sandro had headed back to his bedroom, Arkantis was still lying there, looking up at the ceiling thoughtfully. He was considering all that Sandro had said about his dreams for the "goodly, self-aware undead," and the way that the young necromancer seemed to have actually meant it. Even the smiles and laughs that afternoon had seemed at least partially a mask of some sort, concealing his cousin's true feelings, although there was no doubt he _was_ glad to be home. But there had been a moment, when he had spoken of that place he saw in his mind, when it had really, truly seemed like Sandro.

It was a long time before he finally slept, and as his eyes slid slowly closed, he was thinking about something that another redhead had told him only a few weeks ago, and wondering exactly how he was going to talk Sandro and Trendal into it.

* * *

Bright and early the next morning, Arkantis bounded out of bed and was bathed and dressed before Aslenne and his mother had finished making breakfast. Sandro, as usual, could not be persuaded to rise from his bed until long after the sun had risen from behind the pear trees, and grumbled as he dressed slowly, cursing at his foster-brother through the door in six languages, only three of which Arkantis actually understood. When Sandro finally opened the door, his crimson hair still tousled with sleep, he gave the bard a long, malevolent look filled with the promise of pain, which was marred only slightly by the massive yawn he barely restrained.

"I ought to turn you into a newt," he threatened.

Arkantis _tsked_ and straightened his hat on his braided hair. "Come on," he said, "we're going to Ren's, remember?"

"Without breakfast?" Sandro protested. "Trendal can wait." His cousin _harrumphed_, but the young necromancer ignored him, saying, "He eats more than _you_ do; if he knew we were coming, I'm sure he'd understand a delay in the name of food." With that, he brushed by and went to find a place at the parlor table.

All through breakfast—nearly lunch, really—Arkantis squirmed impatiently, until Sandro, fastidiously dabbing his lips with a cloth napkin, laid down his knife and rose, stretching, from the table. Patting his bare midriff in satisfaction, he thanked his mother and his aunt, kissed them both, and clapped a hand on Zoltan's shoulder as he passed by way of farewell. The old warrior grunted in response, still shoveling smoked autumn sausage into his mouth.

Arkantis eagerly followed him outside; neither of them saw any point in pausing to gather their weapons, which were hanging in the hall by the front doors; in Shadowdale, they had nothing to fear from highwaymen or beasts, and so they made for Trendal's house unarmed, save for the dagger that hung horizontally from the back of Sandro's belt.

The Kingshand home was not far from the Ironreach residence, and it was not long before the pair gained sight of the trim, cozy little house. Two stories tall in the front, the timbers of the building's frame were stained dark, like Sandro's home, and its walls were whitewashed to within an inch of their lives—a reflection of the orderly and somewhat ascetic lives that moved within. Arkantis bounded past Sandro and clunked the heavy doorknocker several times against the polished surface from which it hung. After a moment, the door opened to reveal a stern-looking and serious-faced man, his short brown beard streaked with gray, wiping his hands on a coarse towel.

"Well, well," he said gruffly, "if it isn't my best student and my best assistant, together at once. Come in, come in." He stood aside to let them pass, shutting the door quietly behind them. "How are you both?" he asked in hushed tones, his eyes smiling even though his face did not.

"As well as can be expected," Sandro replied, matching the volume of his own voice to that of his host's. "It's good to see you, Furalith."

"And you as well, young Master Ironreach." He clasped hands with them both before leading them down the short hallway and into the office off one side. There, he tucked the towel in his hands into one pocket of his long, white canvas apron, crossing his arms over his breast. "How long are you both visiting?" Furalith asked then, in a more normal tone of voice.

"That depends entirely on how long you let us stay," Arkantis rejoined merrily.

"I _meant_," the man said admonishingly, "how long will you both be in Shadowdale? Trendal will be pleased to see you, I expect. He came to us last night and told us that he had finished his tenure in Cormanthor. Although, I might add, only after he stopped by the Old Skull to see your mother," he said to Arkantis, "trying to find out whether or not either of you were home on leave from your own apprenticeships."

"Big Brother sent ahead to tell Auntie Aslenne we were coming," the bard explained, "but they decided to surprise Mother. She didn't know until she came home last night, herself."

"Ah. Well, I shall let him know he has visitors, and then I really must return to my work. Goodwife Cierdan was brought to us earlier this morning in the midst of false labor, and I've been working with her ever since she decided to go into _real_ labor just after, the devious young woman. Belle has her hands full with three sick children, not to mention two adventurers that were brought to us after they stumbled into a local tavern four days ago with the red ache. Selûne knows how they got it."

"I wondered why we were whispering a moment ago," Sandro said, making a face even as Arkantis paled, and Furalith nodded to both of them before climbing the stairs to find his son.

"Don't worry about it," Sandro chided when the old chirurgeon had disappeared up the steps. "This whole place is sterile enough to make a strong man weep, especially the surgery, which is where they're keeping them, I'm sure. Besides, you told me you worked here with Trendal for almost a year after I left for Ethric's, helping his parents do what they do. I can't imagine you're still as afraid of getting sick after all that as you used to be."

Wanly, Arkantis smiled. "Not as much as I used to be, I suppose. But still… The red ache is a nasty disease, and I've always taken after Mother, you know."

"You were a sickly child," the necromancer told him firmly, "but you aren't a sickly adult. You grew out of it, so there's nothing to worry about. If there was anything wrong with you worse than those allergies, you'd never have been able to go stay with Golden Chord, would you?"

"You're right, really, I know. It's just hard not to worry, since all I can remember doing while I was growing up was lying in bed, catching every malady that floated through an open window. In between getting shouted at, of course," he added somewhat bitterly.

"That's not a part of your life anymore, either," Sandro said sharply. "The greatest worry you have now is whether or not you'll ever grow out of your allergies, too, so you can sing as well as you play. I've never heard of a proper bard who couldn't sing, you know."

Arkantis gave a little chuckle. "Golden always used to despair of ever teaching me to—" He was interrupted by the sound of footsteps on the stair, and Furalith came back down into the room.

"He's coming down," the healer told them. "Fell asleep at his desk again, poor lad. I don't think he slept a wink last night; he stayed up talking with his sister until nearly dawn. I'll leave you three to it; I have herbals steeping and some poultices to mix up after I pour this last potion down Goody Cierdan." Nodding by way of farewell, he slipped out into the hall and left them.

The pair of them waited anxiously until they heard the heavy tread of tired feet on the floor above, and a young man about their own age stumped down the stairs, half-dressed in a pair of leather breeches and barefoot, his unruly brown hair wild and spiky as they remembered it, as though it hadn't been combed the whole time he'd been with the elves. Scratching his head with one darkly-tanned hand, he yawned hugely and settled a pair of gold-wire-rimmed spectacles more firmly on his nose. His eyes widened as he took in the pair of faces—one mischievous, one impassive—that confronted him.

"Ark?" he gasped in surprise. "_Sandro_?"

"Hmm…" Sandro murmured to his foster-brother, his gaze flicking over Trendal in cursory inspection. "I thought he'd be taller by now."

"No," Arkantis said, grinning wolfishly. "Even elven high magic can't cure shortness. It's a terrible affliction, I hear. Affects hundreds more every year."

"We're all doomed," the redheaded mage mourned, rolling his eyes ceilingward.

"I'd be more worried about incompetence and vanity," Trendal retorted, his fists on his hips as he stood at the foot of the stairs. "At least shortness isn't catching."

"Just like old times," Sandro said, finally smiling.


	6. Together Again

There was much backslapping and merriment between Arkantis and Trendal as the three friends were reunited, and Sandro greeted the newly-ordained druid with a solemn handclasp. They immediately began exchanging tales of their apprenticeships, Sandro casually vilifying Ethric and Arkantis elevating Golden Chord to a bardic priestess with the patience of Ulutiu. Trendal, in turn, told them all about his druidic training, mostly a lot of hiking about in the forests of Cormanthor and learning the lay of the land, the habits and peculiarities of animals and plants, and how to tap the subtle pulse and flow of the environment around him to power the mysterious and sometimes terrible magic of the druids. There had also been instruction in two languages—both Elvish and the secret language of the druids—although he was still learning the sylvan tongue of the woodland beings.

"What are these marks?" Arkantis interrupted him at one point, dimpling Trendal's cheek with his fingertip as he poked the young druid's face. Two black stripes, like those of a tiger, ran from the height of his right cheekbone down and under his jawline onto his neck.

"Some kind of proof of membership, I think," Trendal replied, shoving the bard's intrusive finger away. "A lot of the other druids in Cormanthor have them, too, in different places. It was never really fully explained to me, so I think it's something I'm supposed to figure out for myself, like some kind of ranking system. I think it might have something to do with my being human, too. Apparently, there have never been any humans accepted into a druid circle in Cormanthor, since all the forest dwellers are elves of one kind or another. They only took me because Elminster himself asked them to."

"Perhaps we should go somewhere else and continue our discussion, Ren," Sandro interjected, cocking his head to one side as he heard the bell out front. The knocker on the Kingshand door was for regular guests; the bell was reserved for incoming patients bound for the surgery, and pulling the cord by the door set off a clanging that filled the whole house, designed to rouse every member of the family for the emergency.

Trendal nodded in agreement, standing up from his perch on the office counter. "I'll go and see if Mother and Father might need our help; if they don't we can go down to the Old Skull and play layabout by Elminster's tower."

"Wait," Sandro said, restraining him with a slender hand; the necromancer's flesh lay pale against the bronze of the much shorter young man's bare, muscular shoulder. "How would you like to have everyone down at the Old Skull for dinner tonight? I can ask Mother, if you'd like."

The druid's face split in a grin beneath his spectacles. "That sounds wonderful."

"One moment." Shutting his eyes, Sandro sent out a probing thought, his mind questing over the Ironreach home. When he got no response, he nudged the other mind he was seeking, then stabbed sharply in annoyance. He was rewarded with a disgruntled cawing.

—_Wake up, you useless sack of mattress stuffing!—_ Sandro thought irritably.

—_Hateful,—_ the telepathic voice of his familiar replied, thick with sleep. —_You woke me up.—_

—_Stop complaining and go ask Mother if she wants to have dinner at Jhaele's tonight.—_

Hugin grumbled and, maliciously, woke Vidomina's familiar to do it instead. Sandro waited patiently as the message was relayed from Munin—who was, if anything, even lazier than his brother—to Glimmer, who carried Aslenne's affirmative reply dutifully back to Hugin, who announced it to his master as though the raven had done it all himself.

"Mother says yes," the necromancer reported, opening his eyes again.

Trendal nodded and quietly left the office. It didn't take long for him to come back with a reply. "Father says it's only some fool woodsman with a spider bite and he doesn't need our help. Poor fellow strayed to close to the Spiderhaunt Woods. Oh, and Mother says yes to dinner, too."

"Shall we go, then?" Sandro asked, raising his eyebrows in graceful inquiry.

"Let me pull on a tunic or something. Do you want to come upstairs and say hello to Starla?"

"Of course," Arkantis answered immediately. "Lead the way."

The trio trudged up the stairs and down the hall to Trendal's room, where the healer's son quickly laced on a green doublet. As he grasped the handle of the next door down, Arkantis stopped him, asking in a whisper, "How is she?"

"The same," Trendal replied sadly, his eyes filled with pain.

"Did you try your magic on her last night?" Sandro murmured.

The druid nodded slowly. "First thing, when I got back into town, before I went to Jhaele's to ask Annah whether either of you were around. I knew it wouldn't work, though," he continued, heading off his friends' questions. "I'm just not strong enough yet. I have to find the right combination of spells before I'll make any progress. Sylvianna and Gileam seem to think I can work something out, eventually. I'm not so sure, myself, but…" His voice trailed off sorrowfully.

Gravely, Sandro gave his friend's shoulder a squeeze. "It will all pan out, don't fret. Arkantis was sick all his life, until he grew out of it, and no one could do a thing because it was just nature running its course. Maybe this will turn out to be the same."

"We'll see," Trendal said noncommittally, knocking briefly and opening the door.

The room was smallish, taken up mostly by the bed under the window. The curtains were drawn back, letting in the early afternoon sun, and a young girl was propped up on pillows under the coverlet, quietly perusing a little book of Illuskan poetry. She looked up as they entered, a wan smile coming to her drawn and tired face—a pretty face, despite her obviously poor health. Her long chestnut hair spilt over the pillows, and her brown eyes sparkled, albeit dully.

"Hello again, Ren," she breathed wearily. "Hello, Sandro, Arkantis. It's good to see you again. Are you well?"

Trendal immediately moved to his sister's side, taking her small, pale hand as he seated himself carefully on the edge of her sickbed. Arkantis said, "Well enough, Starla. And you?"

"Oh… Improving, I think. I've been a bit better lately. Father says that he has a chair with wheels on it; I may be able to sit in that for a little while outside, in the garden. That would be nice." Even this much speech seemed almost to exhaust her.

"We're going out," Trendal told her, his cheerful tone betrayed by his eyes. "Would you like anything while we're in town?"

Smiling, Starla coughed a little and replied, "I need a new ribbon for my hair. This one has become rather frayed, I fear." Extricating her hand from her brother's, she slowly reached out to the little table by her bed—no one missed the violent tremors in her fragile arm—and lifted up a sad, limp little strip of pink silk to show them. The ornament seemed to mirror the condition of its mistress.

"Easily done," her sibling told her at once. "The same color?"

"Blue, I think," she wheezed, her bowlike little mouth still smiling at the bottom of her sickly features. "I have a lovely dress that I long to wear…outside…in…the garden…" Her eyes, unfocused, fluttered shut, and she was deeply asleep in just a moment.

Solemnly, Trendal rose, straightening her arm, with the fingers of her hand still curled lightly about the ribbon, alongside her. He shook his head as despair filled his face. "Even talking drains her. She seems to be hanging on only because she refuses to die…"

Wordlessly, Sandro and Arkantis followed their despondent comrade back downstairs. Neither spoke, but both were thinking about Starla's strange illness—the bane and ultimate frustration of an entire family of healers. The girl had slowly taken sick many summers ago, and had floated dangerously back and forth across the borders of life and death ever since. Clerics of Ilmater and even—a great strain—Talona had been unable to diagnose her affliction, and Elminster himself, along with Storm Silverhand, the Bard of Shadowdale and one of Arkantis's personal heroes, had been confounded. It was eventually the old Sage of Shadowdale who had called in an ancient and mysterious favor to have Trendal inducted into an elven druid circle, hoping that, where magicks arcane and divine had failed, the power of nature might yield a cure for the unnatural. Now Trendal had returned, druidic powers in hand, and still Starla teetered on the brink of oblivion…

Belle was in the office when they descended the steps, looking through a book of dates and receipts for something. She smiled when she saw them, asking lightly, "And where are you three bound?"

"Probably for the Old Skull," her son responded with forced cheeriness. "Are you sure you don't need us?"

"We'll manage, dear. It's only spider poison—uncomfortable, but likely not fatal even if we don't treat it, despite the size of the bite. The brute that got its fangs in him must have been waist-high." She shook her head, which was covered in a sort of white wimple that matched her spotless robe, leaving only her face and hands exposed to her patients. "Pure folly, to be lumbering that close to the Spiderhaunt. Ah, well. Foolishness, unfortunately, is one of the few things that neither my magic nor your father's chemicals can cure. We'll see you lads tonight." With a final, kindly smile, she left the room, carrying the book.

"So," Arkantis said as they stepped outside, meandering toward the looming landmark of the Skull. Trendal seemed to perk up in the sunshine, but Sandro only grimaced and shaded his eyes. "Mother mentioned a unicorn and an elven lady at the tavern last night. Were they with you?"

"Yes," the bespectacled druid confirmed. They were an incongruous crew as they plodded down the road, with Trendal seemingly dwarfed by his companions; Sandro's lean, six-foot frame towered more than half a foot over him, and Arkantis, on the other side, was only an inch shorter than his cousin, but appeared even taller thanks to the narrow-brimmed black hat perched on his blond head.

"And?" Sandro prompted, curious as well.

The distance to the Skull, which was not really that much, passed quickly as Trendal elaborated on his teachers, explaining how Sylvianna and Gileam had taken him in hand and personally overseen his training. "They took lodgings at the inn, so you can meet them tonight, before they leave to return to Cormanthor."

"Jhaele missed top coin when she didn't put on that addition for 'unusual tenants,'" Arkantis said gleefully, thinking of a disgruntled unicorn standing in the dark stable, sorrowfully munching the bland hay there.

"She didn't really want to spend the money," Sandro drawled as they climbed the hill, passing Elminster's unassuming tower without a second glance. They had all three been bounced on the Sage of Shadowdale's knee when they'd been in swaddling. "She's an innkeeper, after all. At heart, she's as tightfisted as that old grudgecoin Cyrus down the west lane."

"Better not let her hear you say that; the old scorchkettle'll boot you where you live, like as not." The bard flopped carelessly down on the ground in a grassy spot, from whence the three could see most of the Dale easily. Trendal joined him with somewhat more dignity, lowering himself into a half-sitting, half-reclining position where he was propped up on his elbows. Disdaining the grass, Sandro seated himself on a flat rock, thoroughly dusting it off first with a flick of his hand and a muttered phrase in Draconic.

Many hours and afternoons had passed thus, and these idle positions were not unfamiliar to a trio of boys—one lanky and redheaded, one shorter and darker, and one wheezing and coughing with the thrill of escape—who had repeatedly scaled what to many outsiders was one of the most fearsome dungeon gateways to the Underdark in all of Faerûn. Now, all unconcerned, three young men lounged atop the home of hook horrors, dark elves, and worse, loitering away the day and swapping the few tales of their recent lives that they had not already exchanged.

Eventually, the sun grew red, and the light began to die into the west as it sank behind the distant mountains. Evening stained the eastern sky, as though Shar herself had poured it full of purple ink, and the necromancer, the druid, and the bard rose to their feet, wandering in no particular hurry back down the slopes.

"I'd better get to the clothier's before she closes, if I'm going to get Starla her ribbon," Trendal announced when they reached the bottom.

"We'll come along," Arkantis said. "We've nothing else to do anyway, and it isn't far."

That particular chore took only a few minutes, after which they wove their way back through the streets to Jhaele Silvermane's inn by the hill, where cheery yellow light was already shining through the windows, piercing the fast-encroaching gloom. From the open yard nearby, the clang of steel on steel drew their attention, and they rounded the corner of the building to see a sphere of light hovering over two embattled figures, which drove against each other again and again with their swords, expertly slashing and parrying in a graceful dance of death.

"Where's Vi?" Sandro called out to them, unruffled by the seemingly ferocious display.

"Already inside," his mother's voice answered him. "Your father and I were just passing time. Move to the left a bit, Glimmer, dear." Obligingly, her familiar bobbed in the direction indicated, and, her blue robes swirling, Aslenne launched a rapid series of heavy blows against her husband. The long blade of her sword flickered with an eerie azure light, leaving an eye-watering trail in the air behind itself with each swing, and Zoltan's weapon was wreathed in billowing orange flames that spat sparks with each impact.

They flailed at each other a bit longer before a mutual halt was called, and the couple, panting only slightly, sheathed their swords together. Glimmer drifted down to shoulder height as Zoltan wiped sweat from his short red beard, his white eyes reflecting the glow of the lantern archon with an unwholesome gleam. "Not bad for a wizard," he huffed, smiling as he straightened his tunic.

"Not bad for a blind man," Aslenne rejoined, taking a purple, prism-shaped gemstone from its place in her belt pouch and setting it to orbit around her head, as she usually did when she left the house.

"You almost got through a couple of times, there."

"_Almost_ only counts with ice bolts and fireballs, dearest."

The group drifted back around the corner and inside, where only a few other patrons had tables tonight. Vidomina was seated at a long oaken one near the roaring fireplace, silhouetted by the flames so that she looked mysterious and powerful, like her mother. Trendal's parents and Annah were there, as well, chatting idly with the youngest Ironreach. Greetings were passed around, and before long the nine of them—familiars not included—were laughing and talking about nothing much. Jhaele herself brought out platters of steaming beef swimming in gravy, roasted potatoes, soft, dark bread, mugs of stout ale, and a bottle of wine, joining in the conversation and trading stories along with the rest. Before too long, the others in the large common room—there were a good deal more by now—were lighting pipes and drawing their chairs unobtrusively closer, drawn into Belle and Furalith's accounts of particularly strange or dangerous cases they had treated, or hooked by one of Aslenne and Zoltan's reminisces of some fantastic adventure. Arkantis recounted the time that Golden Chord had tried to teach him to play the choral horn, Finder Wyvernspur's own instrument, evoking many chortles with his fair imitation of her quirky dialect, and Sandro set aside his aloof manner long enough to regale them with his first failed attempt at summoning a fire elemental—a feat in itself, since admitting failure in anything came hard to the necromancer.

A momentary pall was thrown over the gathering when Trendal murmured, "I wish Starla could be here."

"Don't worry," Belle told him, hugging him close, "Tybalt's with her. She'll be fine, and I'm sure she'd rather you enjoy yourself at this little homecoming celebration than mope about her condition."

Reluctantly, Trendal allowed a smile to come to his face again, and Jhaele lifted the mood again with a story of her own, during which the phrase "You almost had to have been there" featured quite prominently.

About halfway through the evening, the audience called for one of Jhaele's famous elven ballads, and the innkeeper could be persuaded only when Arkantis threatened to sing it himself, and someone hurriedly pushed a harp into his hands while his mother rushed to join Jhaele in song.

Everyone was surprised when a third voice took up the melody, blending so perfectly with the mellifluous waterfall of notes from the harp that it was difficult to distinguish where one left off and the other began. All eyes turned toward the stairs, where a beautiful, golden-skinned elven maiden with a river of silver hair and a plethora of strange blue and green tattoos had soundlessly descended and taken a seat when no one had been looking. Trendal's smile grew broader as she drew out the last strains of the ballad, her voice sinking easily to harmonize with those of Jhaele and Annah. The audience applauded loudly when the final golden tones of Arkantis's masterful playing had died away, calling for more.

"Foolishness!" the mistress of the Old Skull snapped, dashing the mist from her eyes with the back of one hand. "Get back to your ale! I have another cow that's got to come off the spit, if it isn't burning." Respectfully, she inclined her head to the elven woman, who returned the nod politely. "They call me Silvermane, my Lady," she said, "but I put the title to shame before one such as you."

The elf smiled as Jhaele hurried into the kitchens at the rear, fluttering inconveniently-placed patrons out of her way with hands and oaths. As some of the popular interest turned away from them all, she rose and came over to their table. Trendal hurried to rise and make introductions.

"Everyone, this is Sylvianna—my teacher." They all rose to greet her, and she accepted the attention tolerantly, respectfully bowing to each of them in turn.

"Your son has told me much about you," she said to the healers. "It is an honor."

"And to us, as well," Furalith replied gravely. "You have helped our family without knowing us, and may yet save our daughter's life."

"Thank you," Belle added wholeheartedly.

"We have heard much of you today, as well," Arkantis told the druidess. "Where is your companion?"

"Gileam chooses to remain in the stable of this place. He prefers the outside, such as it is. He is more uncomfortable than I in a civilized setting."

"May we meet him?" Aslenne inquired.

"Certainly," Sylvianna responded. "I believe he would be honored to make your acquaintance."

She led them outside and around to the stables, where the interior was dominated by a white stallion, many hands high, his golden horn shining in the gleam of Glimmer's light. Once again, introductions were made, and the noble beast suffered Arkantis to stroke its mane in wonder, seemingly amused at the bard.

"What's wrong, son?" Zoltan asked suddenly, without turning. Everyone paused to look at Sandro, who stood in the open door of the stable, shifting his weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other and back.

"Nothing," the necromancer replied, a little too quickly. "I'm fine. It's just…stuffy in there, that's all."

Gileam gave him a speculative look, tossing his mane with a snort.

"Well, you can come in for a moment, surely," Aslenne frowned.

"Or it is no trouble for me to come outside," Gileam said, a strange note in his voice that no one but Sylvianna noticed. She cocked her head to one side, looking from the unicorn to the young mage with interest.

"Don't trouble yourself," Sandro grated through a brittle smile.

"On the contrary," the equine murmured, "I would much rather be out-of-doors in any case." He took a slow, deliberate step towards the door.

Sandro retreated a step, his eyes narrowing. "Oh, I think you're fine right where you are. I'd just hate it if you bruised your hooves on the cobblestones out here."

"You needn't worry," Gileam said. "I shan't. But I think I will remain here after all. I am tired from being cooped up all day. I would rest now, so that we may return to Cormanthor early tomorrow."

So saying, he whinnied a farewell and retreated into a stall.Sylvianna also bade them goodnight, and the group wandered back into the inn to resume their meal.

"What was all that about?" Arkantis asked Sandro curiously when they were seated once more.

"I'm sure I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about," the redhead replied distantly.

Dismissing it with a shrug, his cousin picked at a plate of stew, humming tunelessly. When everyone else was eating quietly again, he straightened in his chair and said, "I've been thinking."

"Mystra preserve us," Sandro muttered.

Ignoring him, the bard continued. "We've all finished our time as apprentices—you, me, Ren. What are we going to do now?"

"Haven't we done this bit?" his foster-brother yawned.

"A lot of adventurers pass through Shadowdale," Arkantis went on, "and a lot of those pass through Ashaba. Alias—Finder Wyvernspur's daughter, the sellsword—winters there with her friends almost every year. She's seen and done so much—maybe as much as you have, Auntie Aslenne, Uncle Zoltan. She told me about all of her adventurers, and I—I spoke with her about what I'd like to do, now that I'm a full bard."

"And?" Aslenne prompted gently.

"I want to become the most famous bard ever!" he blurted. They stared at him. "More famous even than Finder," he pressed on, "and the richest, too! I want to write songs about myself and hear other bards sing them—to join the Harpers and go to all sorts of strange places with Storm Silverhand, or meet people like Golden Chord must've when she disappeared all those years ago. I want to be the best there is," he finished.

A long silence followed. Finally, Zoltan said, "Well, there's certainly no better way to make a name for yourself than to slay dragons."

"Lost ruins," his wife argued. "You can't go wrong with unearthing lost ruins. There must be a hundred cities buried in the Anauroch, not to mention that swamp in Halruaa and the gods only know what in Icewind Dale."

"What about lost artifacts of ancient power?" Belle put in curiously.

"Don't know," Zoltan said merrily, "we never found any."

"Well, there was that scepter—" Aslenne started.

"I don't want to talk about the scepter," he cut her off. "We _never_ talk about the scepter."

"Actually," Arkantis managed, bringing the chatter to a halt, "Alias had a number of ideas I quite liked."

"Such as?" Sandro queried, one eyebrow arched. He still seemed in a bad mood after the odd behavior with the unicorn.

"She told me about a place," the young bard said, his eyes growing distant with the thought, "an elven kingdom that vanished, long ago."

"All the elven kingdoms vanished long ago," Zoltan growled. "That's what they do. I think they make them that way just to confound us humans—no offense to your teachers, Ren."

"None taken."

"No," Arkantis groaned, "a _specific_ elven kingdom. They called it the Misty Isle—I don't think they even remember its name anymore. The god of the kobolds and—and—some…other god made the whole island vanish. They never found it, though they've looked for thousands and thousands of years. Wouldn't it be something to discover it again?"

"The elves would make songs about you forever after," Furalith postulated.

"I'm more concerned with finding a cure for my sister," Trendal said, shaking his head. "I don't know where to start, but… I want to set out soon to look, maybe in places like Waterdeep or Silverymoon. I was hoping I could convince you two to come with me, perhaps."

"Well, I'm bound for the Wizards' Reach, I think," Sandro shrugged. "Or maybe Aglarond. I'd like to dig through some old spellbooks and maybe do some research, see if I can't find a precedent for a fully necropolitan society. I'd like to do that." _And splatter little bits of Ethric all across the Desertsmouth Mountains_, his brain sang.

"My brother wants to found his own little realm," Vidomina said dryly, "where the not-dead and the undead can, aha, _live_ together in harmony."

"But don't you see?" Arkantis said, growing excited. "We can do it all! If we set out in search of a place like the Misty Isle—or somewhere, anywhere, anything, whatever—we can go to places like Waterdeep and Silverymoon, the Wizards' Reach, all those places! You'll have a chance to look through forgotten, ancient libraries as we search ruins and such for clues, Sandro, and Trendal is sure to pick up some answers to Starla's illness along the way. If we actually _found_ the Misty Isle, why—Corellan Larethian himself might be persuaded to grant us a favor. He might even heal Starla!" He sat back triumphantly while they digested this.

"It's a little farfetched, I think," Aslenne finally said, slowly. "All of it. But… Most adventures start out farfetched, I think. Don't they, dearest?" She smiled and took Zoltan's hand across the table.

"Most of ours did, as I recall," he answered, his face softened by fond recollection.

"My little boy," Annah sighed, "my son…" She embraced Arkantis fiercely. "A professional adventurer! Who would have thought it? I think that, whatever you do, you'll end up just as great as you want to be. Isn't that right, Len?"

"The sky is no limit," her sister replied, quirking a grin.

"Can you imagine?" Trendal said, half-smiling at Sandro. "Us? Adventurers? We'd be dragon fodder in less than a tenday, I know it."

"Ha!" the wizard snorted. "_You_ might be. I'm not worried at all, thank you, except about what I'll have to tell everyone when you get yourselves incinerated."

"So you're interested?" Arkantis pounced on the statement.

"I didn't say that," Sandro responded blandly. "But…" He smiled faintly. "I didn't say it was a terrible idea. I'd rather go to Silverymoon before I went across the Sea of Fallen Stars, in any case. They have better weather, and they wrote the book on tolerance of strange races and customs."

"Do you really think there's an answer out there for Starla?" Trendal wondered.

Zoltan ruffled his hair affectionately. "There is always an answer, provided you're asking the right question," he offered cryptically.

"Thanks." The young druid rolled his eyes.

"We don't have to decide right away," Arkantis added hastily. "We have all the time in the world."

"All the time in the world…" Sandro repeated. Then he grinned.

_The more time I have_, he thought, _the less of it that's left for Ethric_.

The thought had teeth in it.


	7. The Adventure Begins

The next two tendays passed uneventfully in Shadowdale, insofar as any given day in Shadowdale can possibly be uneventful. Arkantis played his harp for Starla, when she was awake, and helped out here and there in the Kingshand surgery. Trendal saw Sylvianna and Gileam off on their way back to Cormanthor, and afterwards spent hours either assisting Aslenne in her garden—much to the wizard's delight—or his parents alongside Arkantis, mixing potions and knitting bones with his new magic almost as efficiently as his mother did. He dwelt constantly on his teachers' parting words, however, preoccupied with their implications.

"Fare you well, Trendal, son of Furalith," the wood elf had told him from astride Gileam's broad back. "Seek aid in the name of our god, Rillifane Rallathil, or in the name of your human goddess Mielikki, a friend and ally to the Seldarine. If you need us, we shall always haunt the forests of our forefathers, and you may find us there. Call to us when your sister recovers, and the elves of Cormanthor shall celebrate your success with a revel such as has not been seen in the woods since the fall of Myth Drannor."

"Fine words and fine wishes," Trendal grinned, slapping Gileam's withers affectionately.

The unicorn rolled his eyes. "Two days back among humans and already your respect for your elders is slipping."

"I will endeavor to retain my good manners in the future," the young druid responded a little too contritely. "It is difficult to remember, sometimes—after a life of treating equines as beasts of burden—to remain adjusted to the idea of a horse with sense."

"Horse! Bah!" Gileam stamped a hoof indignantly and flicked his tail like a whip. "You should try it from my end, two-legs." More seriously, he turned his head to look directly at his former pupil, his brilliant golden horn catching the morning sun like an enchanted spear. "Wherever you go, keep your friends closest whom you know best. If your feet should turn to the path of journeying, trust the harp over the scythe and draw always your wits about you in times of battle. The earth be your guide." The unicorn reared and made to gallop off, but got only a few yards before Trendal was shouting with confusion.

"What is all _that_ supposed to mean?" he called after the retreating figures. "Can't you people deliver ancient wisdom in the form of an advisory statement instead of a philosopher's riddle?"

"Let your gaze follow your jade-eyed comrade," Sylvianna's voice drifted back. "A shadow has fallen over that one, and where dark eyes come to rest, so oftentimes do daggers!"

And then they were gone, into the receding mists of the meadows.

And Trendal's thoughts, much like the mists, drifted uncertainly.

* * *

Sandro was just as busy as his friends, but most of his time was occupied indoors, where he was spending a great deal of ink and many sheets of expensive paper making copies of spell after spell, which were all rolled up and thrust into the scroll organizer he had brought home from Ethric's. A lover of neat organization—always a handy trait, in a mage—Sandro carefully labeled each pocket for easy identification during combat or perilously distracting situations. His map case also contained more scrolls than maps, and its individual, interior compartments were filling up quickly.

Jumping spells from his mother's grimoire to his own, and thence to his arcanabula—which was actually bigger than the stationary grimoire, the one not intended for traveling—was simpler and less time consuming, although frustrating, since he could only transfer so many a day before resting. Since the pages of his own spellbook were made of mithral foil, he merely placed a hand on a blank page while gazing at the desired formulae, incanted a short phrase—one of the basics that all wizards knew—and the words and symbols were etched by magic into the silvery surface. That trick never got old, as he had learned from his mother when she had shown it to him as a child.

"Most arcanists never think of this," she had said once while engaged in the process, walking through the streets of Ashaba and trading spell after spell with other wandering mages, "and that's what separates the archmages from the hedge wizards. Those who can turn something as simple as this cantrip into a tool this useful has a mind that can see new ideas easily, and will have no problems later in life, when the time comes to turn your magic to some unforeseen end." Then she had forded the river by making a bridge out of a wall of force.

Time and again, though, the necromancer's attention wandered as he pictured the one remaining, relevant person in Shadowdale that he hadn't gotten to see yet. By this time, Elminster had wandered into the Old Skull and welcomed the three young men all into the wide world of professional spellcasters, without surprise—although he squinted at Sandro in a funny way and smiled around his pipe when the redhead recited his story. Storm Silverhand was nowhere to be found on her nearby farm, but Arkantis shrugged and postulated that she'd get the story from her sister Harper the next time she visited Golden Chord. Syluné, the Witch of Shadowdale, appeared near the remains of the old druid menhir at the wood's edge, as well, and congratulated her young protégés on their successes so far, even going so far as to offer some important adventuring advice before they returned home.

"Don't tangle with any red dragons," the shimmering figure of the ghost said wryly, plucking mournfully at the strings of her spectral harp.

That left only one, and Sandro was currently wondering why, precisely, she had yet to come and see him; word must have gotten around, by now, that he was at home.

"You're not paying any attention at all, are you, son?" Zoltan's voice broke reprovingly through the mage's inner musings.

"Sorry," Sandro replied carelessly. "I was…thinking about something else."

"That much was obvious. Even a blind man could have seen it."

"Ha. Ha. Ha. You're really funny, old man. Has anyone told you that?"

Zoltan shrugged. "I've been called a lot of things in my lifetime by a lot of people—sometimes even in a language I understood. I usually respond the same way every time."

"Which is?" Sandro leaned on his scythe like a staff, letting it take his weight as he cocked his head tiredly to one side.

"Well, the way I see it—" The grizzled warrior was oblivious to his own irony, or, more likely, didn't care a whit. "—you always have two choices of response to any situation: Either with careful thought, or with violence."

"And?"

"After a little careful thought, I usually choose violence," his father told him dryly. "Planning is your mother's department. Now, come on and heft that weapon. Let's see what those skinny wizard arms can do."

Sighing, Sandro lifted the polearm in the stance he had been taught, and gave it another go. Behind him, he could hear the clash of steel on steel as his foster-brother and their druid friend, both stripped to the waist and perspiring heavily—Sandro didn't sweat much, and when he did, it was icy cold, both of which were probably unhealthy qualities—matched blades on the other side of the arbor. The backyard of the Ironreach grounds was always a practice arena on warm days like this one.

Effortlessly, Zoltan parried blow after unenthusiastic blow, his frown disapproving. "Is that all you've got?" gets irritating to hear after the first few hundred times, though, and eventually, Sandro livened up and began to get in a few good swings.

"That's more like it!" the red-bearded veteran grunted, deflecting a staggering swing of the scythe. "Use the curve and reach of the blade to keep your enemies away from you. A sword can't cut what it can't reach."

Their little sparring session took a turn, though, when the slender wizard tried the same technique on his father that he had used to kill the highwayman Shawm. Whirling the scythe with one hand, Sandro ducked under one sweep of Zoltan's sword, tossed his weapon into the air, bent backwards at the waist under a second swing, spun, caught the descending handle of the polearm, and hopped over its shaft as he brought the weapon around under his own feet, its blade curving out to catch behind his father's legs and trip him.

Unlike Shawm, Zoltan did not go down. Instead, recognizing the tactic as one he had, of course, taught to Sandro himself, he knew the appropriate countermove. Somersaulting backwards, he avoided the staggering bite of the scythe, landing neatly on both booted feet in the grass and parrying the backhanded return blow of his son's armament. He was surprised, however, when the necromancer suddenly reversed the weapon with a vicious grin, his hands flickering with the venomous green light that had shone through Ethric's windows the night he had left the tower. The boiling emerald pseudo-flames ran down the length of the scythe's shaft as it swung upward and under Zoltan's guard, knocking his burning sword wide and planting the foot of the deadly weapon firmly in the center of his leather breastplate.

There was a massive concussion, and Zoltan was lifted up and back, tumbling head over heels several feet through the air to land unsteadily on two feet and one hand. The wispy ghost-fire crackled eerily across his body, arcing out into the air and evaporating like mist, to earth itself in the ground nearby. Sandro rested his weapon over his shoulder impudently as his father clambered to a standing position and looked down at his ruined armor, covered with a thin rime of frost and crumbling with rot at his touch.

"You should have told me you wanted to play rough," he admonished with a wolfish grin. "I'd have worn my chainmail." One arm dangled loosely, and he snorted as he gave it a cursory inspection.

"You know how I love to play rough."

"You've been working on your technique, I see," the older man noted, popping his shoulder back into place with a sickening crunch. Pulling his still-flaming sword from where it had landed, point-down, in the soft ground, Zoltan spread his feet and extended the blade with a taunting smile, his blank white eyes narrowed into an unconscious squint. "Let's see what you've got, then."

In reply, Sandro's hand shot up, and the lithe young mage hurled a bolt of misty witch-fire at his father. The sound of it was like a combination of a finger running around the rim of a wet wineglass and the screeching voice of a damned thing, and both Arkantis and Trendal, wandering over from their end of the yard to see what all the commotion was about, both dropped their weapons and clapped their hands over their ears in pain.

The beam of black-edged green tore through the air like a living holocaust, slicing over blades of grass that wilted with frost in its shadow. Zoltan's sword whirled, and green meshed with hellish orange as the deadly bolt ricocheted off the blade's polished surface and into the sky.

"It's one unlucky bird who catches that," Sandro noted, taking advantage of his father's distraction to lock blades with him, forcing the sword downward—but only for a moment, since Zoltan was the stronger of the two.

"Your mother will kill us both when she sees her lawn," the warrior rejoined merrily, nearly taking his son's head off with a massive two-handed swing.

"What in the Nine Hells _is_ that godsawful spell?" Arkantis yelled over the din of singing steel and Sandro's screaming jade bursts of power. The ghostly fire was running up his arms and dancing along his shoulders now, and his eyes were filled with it. The bard watched in awe until Trendal nudged him and, with a pained look, dabbed at the blood running from his ear.

"Finder's beard!" Arkantis swore. "Does it _have_ to sound like the winds of Pandemonium?"

"Perhaps we'd better stop," Zoltan suggested, even as his wife stepped through the back door with a wild look.

"What on Toril is going on out here?" Aslenne demanded. Then, before anyone could answer, "Great Mystra! What happened to my _grass_?"

Trendal and Arkantis fled back into the house as the powerful wizard went into high dudgeon, her hands twitching as though itching to shape a fireball. Sandro and Zoltan both stood ruefully before the tirade, weapons held meekly behind them. When she paused for a breath, her husband sheathed his sword and elbowed their son before snapping a hot red beam at his feet, similar in color to the billowing flames of his sword, sending the necromancer hopping.

"Yes, indeed!" he said sternly. "Where did you learn such behavior, anyway?"

"From the best," Sandro responded, punching his father's red-burning shoulder with a fist shrouded in black and green.

* * *

Much later, Sandro wandered back up the streets of Shadowdale toward his home, his shoulders straight, but his demeanor slightly defeated, nonetheless. He passed the cheery yellow lights of the Old Skull's windows as he trudged through the descending evening, and paused for a moment, wondering if having a drink was the right thing to do. Eventually, he shrugged, and dragged himself into the tavern.

"_Oloré_, deary," Jhaele called across the common room as she noticed him. "What'll you have?"

"Wine," he replied dully, coming up to lean against the bar.

"Red or white, lad?"

"Elvish. I don't care what color it is."

She looked at him with a raised eyebrow, but made no comment as she splashed the brightly colored liquid into a glass for him. He threw it back like whiskey and pushed the glass back across the bar, but covered it with his hand and shook his head when Jhaele made to fill it again.

"So, here to drink, but not get drunk, eh?" the canny tavern keeper observed. "What's your trouble, then, young wizard? A lass, is it?"

"Nnh."

"Thought so."

The necromancer ignored her. "Has Adelaide been in tonight?" he asked carefully.

Jhaele drummed her fingers on the bar in thought. "Was it her you wanted to see?" When Sandro nodded glumly, she gave him a long look. "And you've waited a fortnight to pay her a visit?"

"I was hoping she'd heard I was home and come see _me_," he replied defensively.

"Oh, Sandro, you ought to know better than that! I always pegged you for more worldly than your songbird of a brother. That sort of thing doesn't work with a woman—of _any_ race. Now, if it were a lad you had waiting for you—"

"Don't," the redhead said firmly.

"Oh, hush! I'm just funning—you and I both know there's no shame in such. Your elven lass hasn't been in here, and as far as I know, you'll not find her elsewhere in the Dale, either. She skipped out of town a month back, I think, on some errand or another. She'll be back any day now, like as not."

"Grand," Sandro responded, without feeling. He laid a silver coin on the bar and turned to go, but Jhaele's hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"She'll be back," the woman said meaningfully.

"I won't be here," the young mage replied, and left.

* * *

"So, you've really decided to go, then?" Aslenne said for the hundredth time.

"Yes, Mother," Sandro replied, half-smiling. "There's no harm in it, and I think it's for the best, really. Arkantis has got his heart set on playing out these romantic notions that Alias of Westgate put into his head, and he'll probably go without me if I don't follow him. He's managed to talk Ren into it, too, and while I believe they're both capable of surviving on the road, I'll feel better if I'm there with them. Maybe, once we get to Silverymoon, I can find something innocuous to entertain them where I can keep an eye on them, while I plunder the Conclave library."

"We'll see, dear," Aslenne smiled. "It's hard to watch you all go—you've been home such a short time—but I remember how it was when I was your age, too, and I'll not hold you back like a selfish old woman."

"You're not old," Sandro protested, embracing her fiercely.

"You just remember that," she told him archly. "If you foolishly find yourself on the wrong side of an eye tyrant, you'd best not tell me about it later, or you'll have more to fear than anything he might plan for you. Have you got everything you need?" She tapped his leather scroll organizer meaningfully.

"I can get us out of trouble, if we find ourselves in a tight spot—provided we don't run across a flight of dragons intent on making a meal of us."

"Unlikely. You're too scrawny to make more than a mouthful. Now, give us a hug." She enfolded him in her arms again, planting a kiss on his cheek, and her eyes were shining as she watched him turn to his father.

"Take care of yourself and your cousin," Zoltan said simply, "and watch out for Trendal. A few old friends have sent us a message, and we're to meet them down at the Skull this afternoon to discuss a trip up to Daggerdale; there have been signs of Zhent patrols around Dagger Falls, and they're calling for help to come and exterminate the black-hearted bastards. If you have to come home, or need help, we'll be there for the next couple of tendays or so, so don't hesitate to message Mourngrym or someone else who's nearer by."

"Don't worry," Sandro smiled, gripping him in a rough bear hug. "We'll be fine."

"We'll have Vi keep an eye on you while you're away," his father grinned.

"Woohoo," the lovely diviner said wryly, rolling a crystal sphere around between her hands. "What fun we'll all have together."

"I love you too, Little Sister." Sandro ruffled her hair fondly, eliciting an outraged shriek, and swung smoothly up onto the seat of the cart behind his skeletal mount. Hugin fluttered down from the eaves over the door to perch on the horse's skull as, settling his scythe across his lap, the mage snapped the reins in one hand, waving as he pulled out onto the street. Arkantis followed him, swiftly embracing Annah one last time before scrambling onto the back of his prancing warhorse and turning the animal out of the gates. Since most of the family consisted of spellcasters, frequent communication was unlikely to be a problem, and there was no real need for drawn-out, tearful goodbyes. The boys left without much ado and everyone else went back inside for lunch.

"Where's Ren?" Arkantis asked, urging his horse up next to Sandro.

"He said he'd meet us on the way out of town," his foster-brother replied. "I imagine he's doing the same thing that we were just doing, although his farewell to Starla is likely to take a bit longer."

"Yes," the bard agreed sadly.

The druid was waiting for them at the crossroads near Elminster's tower and Jhaele's inn and tavern, lounging outside as he talked to the Old Skull's owner. He hailed them as they approached, and Jhaele waved warmly, a smile on her face.

"Off to see the world?" she called, grinning from ear to ear.

"We thought we'd find out if the rest of it's as much fun as they say," Arkantis hooted back.

The innkeeper shrugged noncommittally. "Depends on where you go, I'd say. Stay far from the Trollmoors when you get near the Silver Marches, and make sure you see the High Forest if you get a chance!"

"We will!" the blond crowed, running his horse in circles as Trendal clambered up on the seat next to Sandro.

"Farewell, lads!" Jhaele waved again as she went back inside to tend to her customers.

"No horse?" Sandro asked mildly, clucking at his undead steed.

"No, no horse," Trendal replied, amused.

"Hmph."

"You'll see when we get out of town."

It didn't take them long to reach the Dale's edge, where Trendal climbed down from the wagon and stood for some time, his arms spread wide.

"What's he doing?" Arkantis whispered to his cousin.

Sandro shrugged. "Something druidic, I expect."

Both of them jerked their eyes skyward as the flap of enormous wings beat the air above them, and a rush of air kicked a cloud of dust off the road as a huge, feathered shape drifted to earth in front of their friend, who moved toward the avian form, cooing softly.

"Is that a twelve-foot-tall eagle?" Sandro asked flatly.

"A _dire_ eagle," Trendal replied reproachfully, not looking over his shoulder as he scratched the giant bird's head. The big golden eyes closed in pleasure, and the raptor squawked its appreciation.

"A dire eagle."

"Yes."

Shaking his head, Sandro cracked the reins over the bony equine before him, bringing an indignant _caw _from his familiar and starting his cart rolling. Arkantis trailed behind, his eyes fixed on the bird in wonder. "You'll be riding overhead, then?" the necromancer inquired evenly.

"I'll stay low," the young druid promised, as he swung into place in a saddle on the eagle's back.

"Well," Arkantis murmured to himself, "this is going to be interesting."

And they started off for the horizon.


	8. Into The Nightmare

_Author's Note: The preceding chapters have all really been exposition on the characters' backstories—setup for the start of the campaign/quest. This chapter is actually where our current Dungeons & Dragons game began, but if I'd started it right here with nothing before it, no explanation of _why_ we were here, it wouldn't have made very good reading, I felt. With that said, enjoy the real beginning of our little escapade._

* * *

They were three days out of Ashaba, on the south road to Cormyr, when the weather turned on them. The dark clouds that had trailed in Sandro's wake up the Shadow Gap had hung around at the edge of the Dale for nearly half a month, savaging the countryside and waiting for errant travelers to think the road was safe.

"Blast and damn this wretched weather for a trick of those foul-hearted, soulless Zhentarim northmen!" Sandro roared at the sky at one point, in an uncharacteristic loss of control.

"Do we blame the Zhentarim for all our troubles, now?" Arkantis grinned through the driving rain.

"Considering what Father said, I wouldn't put it past them. Besides, if I don't blame somebody who isn't in range," the young necromancer called back in warning tones, "I'm going to start blasting people who _are_."

"I just hope Ren's all right," the bard shouted over the storm. "How can he fly in this?"

"He's above the storm, I'm sure," Sandro grunted.

"You _know_ how he feels about bad weather like this!"

"Which is why he'll be above the storm; I don't think he's capable of flying through it, even with that giant chicken of his. He'd be petrified." The necromancer glanced around, peering through the downpour for some sign of shelter. Finally, he pointed. "There are some trees over there; they won't keep us completely dry, but they'll make this bloody storm more bearable. I'll call Trendal down; you go on ahead." Arkantis nodded and urged his horse into a trot, while Sandro tilted his head back and murmured in Draconic.

It was nearly half an hour before the druid finally joined them under the cover of the trees, dripping wet and trembling violently with cold and fear. Arkantis immediately supplied him with a blanket, which he wrapped gratefully about his shoulders, and led him to the fire. The bard had initially been doubtful about their prospects regarding the cheery little blaze they had now, but he had grown considerably more optimistic after an irritated wave of his cousin's hand had unleashed a blast of magical fire that dried out half the nearby woods.

"We were starting to get worried," Arkantis admonished the shorter young man.

"So was I," Trendal replied, adjusting his spectacles. "It took some time to find a break in the cloud cover. I didn't want to dive straight through—all that lightning, you know." The dire eagle behind him squawked its agreement, fluffing its feathers to dry them and hopping from one foot to the other in agitation.

"It's a nasty one, that's certain," Arkantis concurred. "I haven't seen a storm like this in ages—and still with a tenday to the first of Marpenoth. It isn't time for this kind of weather yet, even here in the mountains."

"I don't think it's natural," Sandro said slowly, from the other side of the fire. He had stripped off his vest to dry, and his lean but muscular torso glistened wetly in the firelight as he stroked Hugin's head, the raven fluttering forlornly on his knee as he tried to warm himself.

"Oh, come off the Zhentarim," his foster-brother chided. "Manshoon himself couldn't reach this far with weather magic. More importantly, what purpose could it serve?"

"Did I say I thought it was Zhentarim in origin?" Sandro raised an eyebrow. "I'm not blaming the Zhents; I just don't think it's natural."

"What makes you believe that?"

Sandro looked around at the trickles of water threading down through the thick foliage above. To him, the water and the air were haunted by ghostly shimmers of blue-green, the residue of magic. It was becoming easier to see it now; he didn't even have to cast the spell anymore.

"Trust me," he said flatly.

"You're right," Trendal agreed, sniffing the air. "I hadn't been paying attention, but… This storm isn't natural."

"These are the same clouds that have been piling up in the Desertsmouths for a while," said Sandro. "It was storming over Ethric's tower the night I left for home. Shouldn't this have broken up by now—or at least be a different storm?"

"The weather itself isn't magical," the druid replied, "just the result of magical activity. Probably some kind of local phenomenon—controlling the weather is powerful magic, and it would take enormous effort to maintain such a spell for so long."

"Even Mother couldn't do this," Sandro admitted grudgingly. "Maybe Elminster or Syluné, but not someone like us."

"Why would anyone want to stir up such a storm over the mountains, though?" Arkantis interjected curiously. "What possible benefit could that have? Even if you were trying to move an army under cover or something, it would really just create more trouble than the effort it saved."

Sandro shook his head. "I don't know, but I don't like it. And I'm going to sleep so I don't have to think about it until I'm dry." He stood up. "Tomorrow I'll shield us from the rain. I'm through traveling in this mess." He turned and disappeared into the darkness beyond the edge of the circle of firelight, gliding away through the shadows toward his oilskin-covered cart.

"We'd probably better get some sleep, too," Arkantis sighed. "You look worn out."

"Nerves," Trendal responded tiredly. "I think I'll stick to the ground in the morning; altitude sickness isn't a good substitute for not being struck by lightning."

The bard chuckled as he scraped dirt into the fire pit. "I suppose not. Sleep well, Ren."

"Sleep well."

And for some reason, they did.

* * *

The next day dawned strangely calm and supernaturally quiet. It seemed that the storm had broken in the night, but a thick, dirty gray fog had sprung up in its wake. The ground was soggy and squelched beneath the trio's boots, and the smell in the air was akin to the fetid rot of a swamp.

"Finder's beard," Arkantis yawned hugely. "I almost prefer the rain."

"Bite your tongue," Sandro's voice floated out of the mists to his right. With a rattle, the necromancer's cart and its skeletal draft horse trundled into view, at first only a blurry silhouette, but coalescing slowly into a recognizable shape. "Now I don't have to waste my magic keeping us dry. This should burn off by noon, anyway."

Trendal shook his head, adjusting the straps on his flight saddle. "I don't like this; I can't even see the sky. I'm going to go up and have a look at the road."

"Be careful," Sandro warned. "Anything on Toril could be hiding in this murk."

The druid nodded and led his companion away through the trees, the great bird hopping awkwardly along the sodden ground like a giant sparrow. They disappeared quickly into the greasy fog.

"It _is_ a bit closed in, isn't it?" said Arkantis, hauling himself up on his horse. Straightening his hat, he threw his long braid over his shoulder and started off through the trees at a walk. "Let's get out in the open before I suffocate in this stuff."

The sound of their passage was dampened by the blanketing mist, and they rode in eerie silence to the edge of the trees. The only noticeable difference when they returned to road was the cessation of the slick black tree-trunks that loomed suddenly out of the gray. The world seemed to have shrunk away to nothing, coming to an end a few feet away in the endless shifting void of the fog.

"Something's not right," Sandro frowned after a few moments. His murmur carried easily through the unnatural quiet.

"What is it?" Arkantis asked, his voice tense. "Do you feel something?" He loosened his rapier in its sheath as his horse tossed its head, snorting jets of steam into the cold, dank morning air.

"I'm not sure," the mage replied. "Something's just…off." His scythe was already lying across his knees, as usual, and he took a firmer grip on the reins with one hand, freeing the other to caress the smooth black shaft of the weapon uneasily.

Both of them started as a piercing cry echoed above them, a keening shriek that shattered the stillness. A few seconds later, there was an enormous _whoof_ and a backblast of air that displaced the fog around them in an expanding ring, setting it to swirling and coiling in sinuous patterns. Trendal, saddled on his avian comrade's back, was pale and wide-eyed as the huge creature flapped its wings a second time, slowing its descent to the ground and landing lightly before them.

"What's wrong?" Arkantis shouted with concern at the look on his friend's face.

"Everything!" The druid's voice was shrill with alarm. "It's all gone!"

"What are you on about?" Sandro snapped.

Trendal clutched at the sides of his head, his fingers pulling at the unruly brown strands. "The road, the trees, even the mountains! Everything's gone! It's just not there!"

"What?" the necromancer hissed with disbelief. He glanced at Arkantis, and the bard returned his look with one of horror.

"I don't where we are," Trendal continued, visibly trying to get a grip on himself. "I flew up over the fog, trying to see some kind of landmark, and there aren't any. We're not in the pass; we're not even in the mountains anymore. There's no sun—the sky is full of gray clouds in every direction, and there is no indication whatsoever that the sun is up there with them. Wherever we are, it's not Tilvers Gap, it's not Mistledale, and it isn't Cormyr."

"How can you be sure?" Arkantis asked desperately.

The druid's gaze was haunted. "Because the only thing not covered by fog was the sea."

"The sea?" Arkantis spluttered.

Sandro nudged the raven perched on the seat next to him. "Show me." Hugin obediently took off, forgoing his usual protest. Sandro closed his eyes, letting his mind merge with his familiar's as the black bird winged away through the heavy mists. It was only a moment before he broke through the edge, gliding out over a beach made of pebbles instead of sand. There was indeed a lot of water out there, slopping up onto the beach as though it meant business. Hugin staggered in the air, clawing himself around awkwardly as he experienced both his own and his master's confusion simultaneously. The necromancer was already standing solemnly, arm outstretched, when the raven returned.

Landing on the proffered wrist, Hugin fluffed his feathers out and squawked with disquiet. "Looks like an ocean," he commented unnecessarily.

"It does rather," Sandro agreed, "and the nearest body of water that large is more than forty leagues away to the south and east. _Should_ be forty leagues away," he corrected himself. "If we're where we're supposed to be."

"That's looking pretty unlikely," Trendal put in. "I told you. Something's happened—the magic in the storm last night must've done something, moved us or changed the terrain."

"It would take a hell of a lot of magic to reshape a mountain range overnight," Sandro said doubtfully. "We must've been moved."

"But who would do that?" Arkantis protested. "And why would anyone do that?"

"I don't think anyone did," his brother answered. "I think we've had an accident, is all."

"An accident?" Ren spluttered. "What kind of accident could move a mountain range?"

"I'm telling you, we're not on Toril anymore—or at least, we're somewhere else on Toril," he added as the other two paled. "Can't you feel it? The magic is different here. Look at Bink—at my horse." They followed his pointing finger, and indeed, the undead creature was pawing at the ground and tossing its head like Arkantis's horse, rather than standing stock-still as it usually did when at rest.

"Something's affecting it," Trendal observed. "What could have changed?"

"That's why I said we're probably not on Toril. The connection to the Negative Energy Plane is stronger here; I can feel it, and so can Bi—the horse. We were getting fairly close to Tilverton, and the Weave is torn there; no one's figured out why yet. There have been a lot of…disturbances recently. I think we've plane-shifted."

"You mean we've left the Prime?" Arkantis said, half in excitement and half in fear.

"I'm lost," Trendal frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"You know we're not alone in creation, right?" Sandro sighed.

"Of course not. Everyone knows there are other…worlds…" His eyes widened. "Oh, no…"

"My guess is a demiplane or somewhere in the Abyss," the necromancer said placidly. "I can't think of any major planes that have this much fog, as a rule."

"The Abyss," Arkantis repeated hollowly.

"No worries," Sandro smiled grimly. "If we can't find a way home soon, Vi will find us, and then someone will come and get us. Embarrassing, but not fatal."

"What's that?" Trendal interrupted sharply, cocking his head to one side. The mage snapped his mouth shut and concentrated, and Arkantis strained to hear. The fog seemed to silence the world, but they could hear, faintly, the pounding of the surf some yards to their right, and on the beach, the sound of pebbles grating together.

Sandro put a finger to his lips and, taking a firm grip on his scythe, dropped soundlessly from the cart to the ground as Hugin took flight, skimming through the whiteness toward the beach once more. Arkantis slowly unbuckled the oilskin case hanging from his saddle and withdrew his bow, a large one of fine construction. With some difficulty, he managed to string it without dismounting, and nocked an arrow from his hip quiver. Trendal drew his scimitar and settled his shield on his arm, waiting.

At a nearly imperceptible crawl, the redheaded necromancer made his way in the direction of the sound, which grew more pronounced as he approached it. Through his link with Hugin, he could just make out a slender figure, shrouded in a hooded cloak, picking its way carefully down the beach. As the raven circled, the figure slipped on the wet stones and tottered precariously before regaining its balance. Sandro took the opportunity to pounce.

The figure yelped with surprise when he ghosted out of the fog, the curving, silvery blade of his scythe cocked back to strike, but stood its ground, hand dropping to a pouch at its belt.

"I wouldn't, were I you," Arkantis said firmly, sighting down the shaft of a cloth-yard arrow at the stranger's back as his horse walked slowly out of the fog. The newcomer hesitated, then raised its hands slowly in a gesture of surrender.

"Well done, brother mine," Sandro said, never taking his eyes off their captive. "Now, let's see who we have here." He strode forward, and the prisoner flinched back as he raised a hand illuminated by ghostly green witch-fire. Ignoring the movement, the necromancer snatched the edge of the hood and threw it backward, revealing a tumble of straight blond hair and the worried-looking face of a young woman.

"Who are you?" she demanded. "What do you want with me?"

"Nothing," Sandro replied, "unless you want something of us."

"You are not my uncle's men, then?" she asked, relaxing only slightly.

"My dear, I don't even know who _you_ are. Why would I be in service to your _uncle_?"

"Well, you _did_ sort of jump out from nowhere and waylay me," she pointed out.

"We were afraid _you_ might be trying to waylay _us_," Arkantis replied.

"Trendal!" Sandro called over his shoulder. "It's all right, I think. Come on."

"There are more of you?" the woman inquired.

"I'll ask the questions, if you don't mind, my lady," the mage admonished. "My companions and I haven't had a good morning so far, so you'll forgive us for being edgy."

"You aren't from around here, are you?"

"No. I'm a stranger here, myself. Why do you ask?"

"Your hair. There aren't many redheads here, for some reason—perhaps because it attracts attention."

"What sort of attention?" Sandro asked, eyes narrowing.

"Oh," she shrugged, "usually vampires. Sometimes other things, too; bright colors tend to show up better in this wretched, ever-present fog." She indicated her own clothing by way of example, all of which was a subdued sort of blue.

"Vampires?" Trendal said, coming out of the fog nearby. "What did she say about vampires?"

"Apparently, they're a fairly common thing here," Sandro told him, his tone one of interest. "So I was right. We're no longer on Toril."

The woman's forehead wrinkled in confusion. "Where on earth is Toril?"

"Never you mind. Just tell us where this is." He tapped the gravelly beach with the butt of his scythe, producing a low ringing noise.

"If you're from somewhere else, I'm afraid you may find it quite difficult to get home," she said seriously, concern filling her face. "I wish I could help you, but I must help my aunt first. Now could you let me go?"

"Not until you tell us where we are," Sandro replied firmly.

"If my map is correct, then we should be about seven hours down the coast from Mordenheim Manor. Does that help?"

"Not appreciably."

"You really _aren't_ from around here, are you? Oh, my…" She shook her head and touched a hand to her pale cheek. "This is terrible…"

"Out with it, miss," the mage ordered. "I'm beginning to lose patience."

"This is the most horrible place you could ever have chosen to get yourselves lost in," she said solemnly. "A land of nearly perpetual night shrouded in mist and worse, and all who eke out a living here are in constant fear of the Dark Powers, or fall prey to fearsome undead monsters or creatures out of nightmare. Now that you're here, it's very unlikely that you'll be able to escape. Few do."

"I'm not liking the sound of this." Arkantis swallowed nervously and looked to Sandro for reassurance, but the redhead's face had grown paler than usual, and his mouth was a tight line of anxiety; it is never a good sign when a necromancer, of all people, is worried.

"You know where we are, don't you?" Trendal murmured.

"Ravenloft," Sandro announced quietly. "We've stumbled into Ravenloft—the Demiplane of Dread."


	9. Shadows In The Fog

It was a miserable little group that gathered there on the gravel beach. Arkantis and Trendal grew steadily more horrified as Sandro elaborated on precisely what they'd gotten themselves into.

"Ravenloft adjoins a great number of true planes across the multiverse, via the mists," the necromancer told them gravely. "The Quasielemental Plane of Steam, in particular, is riddled with portals and vortices leading here, but anywhere you can stumble too deep into the fog, you can find a gateway to Ravenloft. It is enormous, ancient, and thoroughly evil—perhaps not so inherently evil as the Abyss or the Nine Hells, but evil, nonetheless."

"And people _live_ here?" Arkantis scoffed. "Why?"

The blue-clad young woman—who had introduced herself as Katrina, a girl of about their own age and an apprentice diviner—shrugged morosely. "Most of those who make their homes here are the descendents of adventurers who lost their way in the mists, or of prisoners brought here by the shadow fey and other servants of the Dark Powers. They never managed to escape, and so their children's children, generation after generation, continue to pick out a fear-ridden existence among the monsters that live in the fog."

"Shadow fey?" Trendal frowned. The name sounded ominous, and the fey were creatures close to the hearts of druids everywhere, manifestations of the natural world they were sworn to protect, and which in turn gave them their powers.

"Oh, you'll meet them, eventually—if you live long enough," Katrina said offhandedly. "Warped and terrible reflections of the fairies and nymphs of other worlds that we only hear stories about. There are few true fey here in Ravenloft, most of them prisoners like the rest of us—but unlike us, the twisted nature of the demiplane proves lethal for them, rather than merely an inconvenience. Horrific, terrifying, but beatable. For the fey, who must tap into their surroundings to find sustenance and power…Ravenloft is poison."

"I've been feeling more and more uncomfortable since we arrived here," Trendal admitted to his companions, "and not just from the fog. This place _feels_ wrong, and I think I'm beginning to understand why. I keep trying to tap into the land, the air, the water—anything—and it keeps rejecting me, shutting me out. I don't think my powers will work here."

"Ravenloft is controlled by the Dark Powers," Sandro explained, "beings of utter evil and near-divine status. They decide what comes in and what goes out, which is why it's so difficult to shift away from Ravenloft by magic. You have to be very powerful—stronger than any of us—or else find a gateway to some other plane. They can bar most of the external influence of other gods, like ours, thanks to whatever connection it is that they have to the demiplane. Mielikki has no power here, so neither do you."

"What about us?" Arkantis asked worriedly.

"Do you feel any different?" his foster-brother responded.

"Wetter and colder, but otherwise, not appreciably different, no."

"Our magic works differently, but it comes from mostly the same source—us. We take our power with us wherever we go, and no man or god can forbid us from it, barring special circumstances. On Toril, Mystra controls the Weave, from which nearly all arcane spellcasters draw their magic, and so she can use it to cut them off. If they leave the Prime Material Plane, though, or even our world, and go somewhere where Mystra has no control and no power—and there are such places, I promise—then their magic will return. In most of the rest of creation, the gods don't usually take such an active hand in controlling arcane magic; it probably has something to do with Mystra's origins. This is no time for a lesson in ancient history, however. We have more important things to take care of."

Arkantis was still trying to work something out, his brow furrowed in thought. "But…I thought that wizards drew their magic from outside themselves; only sorcerers draw power from within—right?"

"That's right," Katrina nodded. "That's one of the many differences between wizardry and sorcery. All wizards pull energy from their surroundings to cast our spells."

"_You_ might," Sandro grunted. "Personally, I think it's a stupid idea."

Arkantis's eyes widened. "Are you a sorcerer?" he whispered.

There was a long pause before Sandro began to chuckle, providing an outlet for some much-needed release of tension. Trendal, and then the young bard himself, joined in the laughter, followed by Katrina, who probably wasn't as amused as she was afraid of being left out.

"No," the necromancer smiled, clapping his cousin on the shoulder. "No sorcerer, I. If I were dragon-blooded, do you think I'd have been apprenticed to Ethric?"

"Sorry, you're right. It's just… It would make so much sense, you know? You fling spells like there's no tomorrow, more than Auntie Aslenne can cast, even, and—"

"I'm just smarter," Sandro sniffed. "The smarter a wizard is, the more energy patterns his mind can hold at once. That's all."

"Smarter than Auntie Aslenne?" the bard said doubtfully.

"That _does_ sound a little odd," Katrina commented, her eyes narrowing with either interest or suspicion. Sandro didn't care which.

"I practice…alternative spellcasting," he supplied evasively. "Now, can you help us get out of here? I'd rather not spend any more time in Ravenloft than I must."

Hugin chuckled from his perch on the young mage's shoulder and fluffed his feathers. "Yeah," he chortled, "all this fog is _terrible_. Do you have any idea how long it takes hair like his to dry in this weather?"

"Shut up, you parasitic little loudmouthed bastard."

"Oh, you two will fit right in here," Katrina said sarcastically. "Yes, I think I can help you; a couple of days travel southeast from my uncle's mansion, there's a village, and several more days east of that, a small city. There's a man there who's said to own a one-way portal off the demiplane, although I have no idea where it goes."

"Thank you ever so much," Sandro told her graciously, whistling for his horse. A few moments later, the skeletal creature came trotting out of the fog, trailing the covered cart. The necromancer grabbed the side of the contraption and hauled himself into the driver's seat, using his scythe as a prop. "You've been most helpful," he told the diviner as he picked up the reins. "I truly appreciate it. Let's go, Ark, Ren."

"Wait!" Katrina cried, grabbing a sodden corner of Sandro's expensive black cloak. "You have to help me first! I've come all this way already, and then running into you distracted me, but—"

"My dear, I don't have to do anything I don't want to," the redhead told her, "and right now, what I _really_ don't want to do is spend any more time on the Demiplane of Dread. Farewell."

"Please!" There was a desperate note in her voice.

"Sandro," Arkantis admonished, "the least we can do is see what she wants; she's been helpful."

"Yes, honestly," Trendal chided, frowning. "What's gotten into you?"

Sandro suddenly found himself afloat in a vast ocean of possible replies, and it took him a long moment to choose one that was neither uncivil nor blatantly mean.

"I think," he said slowly, "that this place is getting to me." He looked down at Katrina again. "Why should I help you?"

The other mage crossed her arms defiantly. "Because you need me to find your gateway. If you don't help me, I won't help you."

"You already told me where it was," the necromancer pointed out gently. "I don't need you for—"

"To reach the village, you'll have to cross through the monster-infested forest south of here," she replied. "Then you'll have to travel through the lands of the gypsies, who are notoriously unfriendly to strangers. Then there's the river, the swamp, the—"

"See?" Arkantis said.

Sandro gave the bard a long, long look, then returned his gaze to Katrina, breaking into a wide, charitable smile. Looking the girl over from head to toe very casually, he raised a slender red eyebrow. "So," he purred, "it seems we have a guide. You are too kind to…assist us, Miss Katrina."

Suspicious at his seeming change of heart, not to mention his abrupt shift into a more lascivious tone, Katrina cocked her head to one side. "You'll really help?"

"Of course," Arkantis said gallantly, walking his horse up alongside the cart. "What can we do to aid you?"

Sandro glared at him, then let it pass. "Yes, indeed—what assistance might we…render unto you?" Only the slightest pause in the sentence indicated anything other than blind chivalry. Smiling like a cat with the canary safely in its belly and cream still on its whiskers, Sandro offered a gallant hand to Katrina, extending a silent invitation to ride in the two-seated cart pulled by his horse. Thoughtfully, he interposed his body between its dry, skeletal frame and the tense young maiden, who took the proffered hand gingerly.

"I'm searching for my maternal aunt, Elise," Katrina explained, as Sandro helped her up onto the cart beside him. "She is my mother's twin. Aunt Elise married a man, Doctor Victor Mordenheim, who lost his mind shortly afterward." Sandro, still smiling, leaned forward, and put a comforting arm around the girl, saying nothing.

"What kind of doctor was he?" Trendal asked with a certain professional interest.

"A mad one," she replied. "It is rumored that he performed grotesque experiments on my aunt, and if it is true…I seek vengeance on her behalf. It's a long journey from my home to his laboratory, which is in this area." She seemed unconsciously comforted by the arm around her shoulders.

"That's horrible!" Arkantis exclaimed.

"Such things are too common here," Katrina said grimly. "I have no idea what my uncle has in store for me, but he is aware of my intentions—I sent a letter in response to the rumors, and he has sent men once before to stop me, but whether they had orders to capture or kill me, I do not know. That is why it's so fortunate we ran into one another; you can protect me from him until I discover the truth."

Sandro purred a little and granted Katrina a half-smile. "Of course, my lady," he said, a little too nobly. "What can I do to help? Do you know where this madman's residence lies?" Arkantis stared at his foster-brother, who magnanimously winked back at him, absolving his previous conversational sins over Katrina's hair—which he nuzzled a little.

"Unfortunately, I do not," she replied, twisting her head to look at him strangely, although not angrily. "However, I know it lies in this region. As I said before, we should be about seven hours from there, if we follow the coast, but I've never been to the place, and so have no idea what I'm looking for. I'm sure we can find it if you'll help me in my search." She seemed a little confused at her own words.

"Then we'd best ride on, and keep a lookout for your uncle's house." Sandro smiled at her and snapped the reins, starting his undead horse forward, and she smiled back hesitantly. "Come along," he said over his shoulder. "If we're going to make any kind of progress, we need to start now."

Arkantis and Trendal looked at one another in a mixture of confusion at Sandro's swift change of heart and satisfaction that an escape route seemed to be presenting itself. Finally, the bard shrugged and started off at a trot behind the necromancer, and Trendal wandered over to his patiently waiting avian friend and mounted, spearing upward before gliding over to join the little caravan, which vanished into the fog.

* * *

It had been more than seven hours, with no sign of a house on the beach, when Sandro finally called a halt. Arkantis reined in beside him and Trendal swooped down to perch on the sea-battered pebbles as he turned to face their newfound companion.

"Admittedly, we are traveling more slowly than we could, thanks to our conveyance," he told Katrina, patting the cart, "but still, we've been going faster than you could have gone on foot. Should we not have reached it by now?"

"My directions may have been slightly off—or it may have moved," she said darkly. They all stared at her, and she hastened to elaborate. "Things sometimes shift in Ravenloft; usually only large pieces of the landscape, but sometimes smaller ones, as well. In fact, that's how they get here in the first place—sites of great or concentrated fear and evil from other planes can slowly phase across planar boundaries to end up here." She sighed, disheartened. "Perhaps we should set up camp; the day grows short."

"Does night fall so swiftly here?" Trendal asked.

She nodded. "The nights here are long. It would be best not to travel during the hours of darkness."

"Agreed. I'm not sure I like the idea of camping in such an open space, though," the druid said.

"I may be able to find somewhere safer," Katrina offered. "Let me cast a spell."

"Pray, save your magic, my lady," Sandro told her, standing. Hugin hopped onto his outstretched arm, and he flung the familiar into the air, sending him silently flying into the mists. "My familiar will find a relatively safe location to encamp for the night's duration." With a self-deprecating smile, he said, "I can offer you but scant comfort, but you are most welcome to the rude luxury of my cart and bedroll."

"Thank you," she returned. They sat in silence for several minutes, as the gray of the fog imperceptibly began to dim around them, before Hugin returned.

"There's a whatsit not more than a mile south of here," the raven announced, perching on the back of Sandro's seat.

"A cove?" his master suggested mildly.

"Yeah, one of them."

"That sounds fine," Trendal said, relieved. "Lead the way."

"That sounds _incredibly wonderful_, compared to the current situation," Arkantis corrected.

"Let us hurry," Katrina begged Sandro. "We do not wish to be caught exposed in this land of terror after nightfall."

It took them a quarter of an hour to reach the cove, by which time Katrina was growing increasingly restless and apprehensive. Shielded by the rising coastline and sheltered from the most direct of the sea breezes, it was as close to an ideal campsite as they were going to find anytime soon. As soon as they entered the crescent-shaped little nook, Sandro hopped to the sand, stilled his horse, and offered Katrina a hand down, which the diviner accepted graciously, nervously watching the sky.

"Sandro," Arkantis said gruffly, "you should start lighting a fire; we do not wish to sleep in the cold."

"I agree with Ark," Trendal added swiftly, before the necromancer could reply.

"Indeed," the redhead replied under his breath, disdaining to feel put out at being charged with such a menial task. Immediately, he began a visual sweep of the tide line for driftwood, which seemed readily abundant in this realm of decay. Trees, though, he noted, seemed to be in short supply in the coastal region.

"This place is so bleak," Trendal sighed as he dismounted, echoing Sandro's thoughts. "There aren't even any flowers."

Without much enthusiasm, Sandro gathered an armful of bleached wood and transported it back to the camp, stacking it in a little cone at the center after digging out a pit. "Someone pull those animals around in a circle," he said over his shoulder, working to light the fire. Katrina smiled and quickly moved in close to offer her help, which Sandro accepted gladly.

"Come on, Ren," Arkantis sagged. Together, they coaxed the bard's horse and the wary dire eagle about in a circle with the necromancer's silent undead steed. Meanwhile, the driftwood guttered slightly from the dampness of the fog, then caught and began burning merrily. When the fire was blazing, Sandro returned to the cart and extracted his bedroll, arranging it over the seat in the most comfortable fashion possible, given the limited room.

Trendal was already setting his own blankets down across the fire from Katrina, puttering through his pack in search of food. Grinning openly, Sandro gestured at his handiwork. "Will you rest in the cart, my lady?" said. "Perchance it is safer on the high ground, with us to guard you about your feet?"

"I would be delighted," she returned graciously.

Arkantis yawned, leaning against his horse. "We should draw straws for guard duty," he suggested.

"Good idea," Sandro replied absently. He assisted Katrina up onto the cart, then withdrew his scythe, its blade gleaming wickedly in the firelight. "I'll draw this one."

"You two fight it out," Trendal snorted around a hunk of brown bread and cheese. "I'm going to sleep after I finish this."

"How true to form." Arkantis shook his head, and he and his foster-brother shared a long look. Hopping, graceful as any hunting cat, into the cart next to Katrina, Sandro settled down and pulled the blanket over both of them, arranging the scythe across his knees, and looked smugly at Trendal.

"The druid should keep first watch," he voiced the bard's own thoughts. "Wake me in two hours."

"Agreed," Ark grinned evilly.

"Naturally," Ren sighed, staring into the fire with a smile.

* * *

The druid's watch passed uneventfully, but it took some rather violent shaking to wake Sandro, the heaviest of heavy sleepers. He gazed solemnly down at Trendal, saying nothing, and nodded silently before climbing carefully down from the cart, trying not to wake Katrina. Scythe in hand, he took up a slow walk around the camp's perimeter. The shorter young man rolled himself in his blankets and was quickly asleep.

It was halfway through his watch when Sandro noticed something unusual, apart from Arkantis's unintelligible mutterings. During the past couple of hours, a storm seemed to have overtaken the relatively clear sky of earlier, and lightning flashed here and there through the mists, which seemed to have thinned somewhat. Now that it was possible to see further than a few inches, it stuck out like a sore thumb: Some miles down the coast, on a sharply rising promontory fronted by sheer cliffs, was the silhouette of a large house.

Stopping dead in his tracks, Sandro focused upon it, trying to see it more clearly. To his eyes, it had a strange aura that waxed and waned as the lightning flashed, perhaps feeding off the storm, although at this distance he was unsure. Quickly, he moved to Arkantis's side and shook him awake, keeping one eye on the lightning at all times. The bard grumbled furiously, then jerked into wakefulness, surprised.

"What is it?" he grunted. Sandro wordlessly hauled him to his feet and pointed with the length of his scythe at the distant mansion. Trendal, awakened by the noise, rolled over sleepily.

"What's happening?" he slurred, fumbling for his spectacles. "Are we being attacked?"

"Get up and come see," the necromancer told him quietly.

"What is that?" Arkantis wondered, rubbing at his bleary eyes.

"You can see it, too?" Sandro asked sharply.

"Of course; it's glowing like a Higharvestide bonfire. What is it?"

He shook his head. "Don't know. Almost certainly magic, but not of a kind I'm familiar with. Here? It could be anything."

"Could it be the doctor?" the bard hazarded. "She said he lived in this area."

"Possibly," Trendal said, coming up behind them. "Should we wake Katrina?"

Sandro nodded. "Perhaps, yes. Wake the girl—but gently." He approached the tide line and stood rooted there, willing the blasted fog to part so he could see clearly. "Detestable murk. I hate this."

"There is far too much fog for it to be normal," Arkantis agreed.

"I'm almost completely convinced that little, if any, of this mist is natural." Sniffing the fog cautiously, he shook his head in disgust. "It's magic. Almost all of it. Whether simply conjured or pure illusion, I can't tell, but it isn't real."

Trendal led Katrina back to them, wrapped in Sandro's blankets and still staggering with sleep. Silently, the necromancer indicated the house again. Glancing at the horizon blearily, she picked out the flickering aura; suddenly, she was fully awake and shaking the blankets free. Taking a few steps closer to the sea's edge, she seemed almost mesmerized.

"That must be it!" she cried. "Nowhere else in this region could look like that. I knew you were a good sign in this evil land! Please—in the morning we must head for that house. I beg you come with me!"

Choking back a snort at her description, Sandro nodded as calmly as possible without turning. "Of course, my lady."

"Yes, of course," Trendal smiled gently at her. "We will head out in the morning. Try to rest now. We will protect you."

"Such a woman as you should not beg," Arkantis added heroically. "I will help you, certainly."

Over his shoulder, Sandro spoke sharply. "Be still, both of you. Go back to sleep; I won't have my skin laid bare to the sight of some dark magic because the pair of you drew its attention. Get some rest."

"Aye," Trendal agreed, walking Katrina back to the cart, "sleep now. We'll leave in the morning."

"Vengeance is to be done tomorrow. I need my rest," she assented. In a way, her actions seemed more driven now than before. She climbed into the wagon and curled herself up tightly under the blanket.

Sighing, the druid headed back to his bedroll, drawing his scimitar and wrapping his hand around its hilt beneath the blankets to keep it close at hand. Arkantis mimicked his preparation, cradling his lute to his body and laying one hand across his rapier nearby.

"Wake me later," he mumbled sleepily.

"And me _much_ later," Trendal added from the other side of the banked fire.

"I will," Sandro murmured softly, not expecting a reply. Gripping his scythe tightly, he lifted up his free hand, feeling the power tingling there, latent but present, ready to call forth at need, and smiled grimly at the near-invisible coils of green-black energy writhing between his fingers. Closing his fingers into a fist, he exhaled slowly.

"Vengeance," he whispered to himself. "I can respect that."

And, smiling, he resumed his patrol.

* * *

_Just an aside, my mother read this part of the chapter as I was writing it, and made a humorous comment: She said that his arranging the scythe across his knees kind of killed the romance there. I thought it was pretty funny, considering Sandro._


	10. This Old House

The morning, like all mornings in Ravenloft, was disgusting. They all rose in poor spirits, even Arkantis's usual cheerfulness as dampened as the sodden murk that lay on every side. They said little as they broke their wretched camp and saddled up.

"What will we do when we reach your uncle's mansion?" Trendal asked Katrina, his voice subdued. His avian companion flared damp feathers and ruffled huge wings in discontent, and the druid made _shush_ noises as the diviner replied.

"We shall have to see when we arrive," the young woman sighed. "If my fears are for nothing—doubtful, since Victor's henchmen tried to stop me once the madman knew I was coming—then I shall simply take you where you wish to go. If the rumors, the whispers, are true, then…" She shook her head, a fiery light in her eyes.

"We shall besiege those walls when we reach them," Sandro told her, and they set out towards the house in the distance.

It did not take that long to reach the desolate residence of Doctor Victor Mordenheim—and _desolate_ was precisely the word. The building looked old—almost rickety—and in very poor repair, as though it had been abandoned for quite some time. The shutters, once brightly painted, were faded and hung from rusting hinges, motionless in the breathlessly still air of Ravenloft. The stately brick walls were slimed with foul-looking, thorny black creeper vines and a nasty yellow moss; the eaves sagged under the weight of bleached gray tiles; and the brass decoration on the grand front entrance and the balcony on the second floor was green with verdigris. It stank of rot.

"Looks like no one's home," Arkantis muttered, dismounting with the others at the foot of the steps.

"It looks like there's a stable along that side," Trendal said, pointing. "If it's sound, we can put the animals in there." He wandered over to check, and Sandro glanced at Katrina.

"Not what you were expecting to find?" the necromancer asked quietly. She shook her head mutely. "Well, there's nothing for it but to go inside. Perhaps he's still in there somewhere, if he's mad as you think, or maybe he left some clue as to where he went if he's gone."

"I guess," Katrina responded, shoulders sagging.

"It's all right," Trendal's call came from the empty stable. "Bring the cart around; it's pretty roomy."

The other three joined him in the outbuilding, which looked more like a warehouse for livestock. The druid was standing in the center of the creaking structure, scimitar drawn, his shield hanging loosely from his arm. When Sandro raised his eyebrows at the naked blade, the shorter young man shrugged.

"A rat gave me a scare," he explained, somewhat shamefaced.

Arkantis's horse didn't like being next to Sandro's skeletal steed, but there was little choice, as only two stalls out of many had survived the slow doom brought on by the seaside weather, the persistent mists of Ravenloft, and neglect. There was ample room in the rafters, though, thanks to the collapse of the hay loft, for Trendal's eagle to perch comfortably on a crossbeam.

"Cozy," Hugin cackled from Sandro's shoulder.

"Make yourself useful and go find an open window," his master replied. "Get inside if you can, scout around, and tell me what you find. If you can't get in, come back here and find me."

"Yessir." The raven launched himself up and out through a hole in the stable roof, disappearing into the salt-tainted fog.

"If we don't find the Doctor," Arkantis was asking Katrina, "where do we go next?"

"Perhaps your friend is right," she said, "and he will have left some indication of his whereabouts. We have known each other only a little time, and so I shan't impose upon you to come with me wherever he may have gone. Instead, I will go with you to the town I spoke of and try to help you return to your own world. When I arrive there, I can hire other help and a guide to track him further." She dug her toe into the soft dirt of the floor and scratched a rough map. "If he went south along the coast, he'll probably be in San Francisco. There are plenty of places to hide there, but with my magic, he shouldn't be too hard to find. I know that city."

"Sann-fran-siss-ko," Arkantis repeated haltingly. "What an odd-sounding name. I wonder what language it's in?" Katrina shrugged.

—_I can't get in anywhere. This is stupid!—_ Hugin's mental voice echoed in the vaults of Sandro's mind, distracting him from the exchange.

—_Nowhere at all?—_ the necromancer replied telepathically.

—_Every single window's broken, but would you believe it, there isn't a hole anywhere that I can squeeze through without slicing into something I'm sure I'll need later, thank you very much.—_

—_Fine. Come back here. We'll go in the front.—_ Blowing a noisy sigh up into his bangs, Sandro reported his familiar's lack of success to the others. "We'll just go in the main doors," he finished. "I'll sneak in first, then Trendal, and you can guard Katrina," he told Arkantis.

"Right," the bard nodded, drawing his rapier noiselessly.

"Keep your lute where you can get to it," his foster-brother advised. "We may need more magic than mine, if we run into something big. Everyone be careful." He was already stalking toward the entrance as Hugin returned, settling damply on the shoulder of his vest.

The great double doors at the front of the mansion creaked surprisingly little as Sandro eased them open enough to skulk through, scythe flickering green and black. Trendal followed him, the curved blade of his scimitar and the links of his chainmail merging with the pale mist, making him nearly invisible in the fishy-smelling fog. A moment passed before Sandro beckoned with a green-glowing hand, easily seen even in the thick mist by his cousin and their diviner companion.

The room inside was a large hall, embraced by the curving arms of a double staircase leading to the second floor. Faded rugs of once-expensive shades covered the warped hardwood floors, and a thick layer of dust covered polished brass handrails and marble wall sconces, empty now of scented lamp oil. Doors led off on both sides into other chambers, and a wide corridor penetrated further into the house directly ahead, flanked by tattered tapestries.

"How long ago did you say this man married your aunt?" Trendal asked Katrina uneasily, his whisper echoing slightly in the gloom.

"About four years ago."

"Ravenloft works fast. This place looks like it's been abandoned for four _centuries_."

"We're looking for laboratories, and you know the most about those," Arkantis murmured to Sandro from behind. "Where would it be? Ground floor? Cellar? Gods, I hope it's not in the cellar…"

"Best place is on the ground floor," the necromancer replied thoughtfully. "Room above, space below. Which means…" His eyes rose toward the upper story. "I'd put it upstairs. Fill the first level with traps and alarms, be ready for anyone trying to get up to you."

"You're assuming that he's expecting intruders."

"She sent him a letter, remember? And she's already had one run-in with people trying to stop her coming. He's _definitely_ expecting intruders."

"You're also assuming he's here," said the bard.

Sandro just shrugged. "Mother always told Vi and I that, for someone who has to pick what magic they want to use the day before, it's best to act like the worst that can happen is going to, and to prepare for everything you can think of advance. If you run into a hundred goblins instead of two trolls, you'll still have a fireball, and if you don't run into anything—then you'll still have a fireball tomorrow."

"Do _you_ have a fireball?" Arkantis asked curiously. The redhead gave him a look that should have burned his shadow into the wall behind him and, wordlessly, started up the stairs, one at a time.

"Do _you_ have a fireball?" Ark said again, turning to Trendal. The druid only sighed and put his foot on the other staircase, matching Sandro step for step, as though they had rehearsed it. He had no chance to ask Katrina, for the diviner pulled a slender wooden wand from somewhere in her robe, threatened him with it as he opened his mouth, and scurried up after Trendal. Arkantis gave up and followed them.

Sandro was kneeling when his cousin reached the top, one hand holding his scythe steady across his knee, the other tracing a large oblong disturbance in the dust. To the young mage's eyes, there was just the faintest suspicion of a few blue-green glimmers around its outline—evidence of a magical presence.

"Was there a hatbox sitting there, or something?" Arkantis asked nastily, still miffed at the series of silent reprimands he had received.

"No."

"At least we don't have to worry about any flying vampire hats, then."

"It was a golem."

"_Wha_—" Ark barely managed to stifle his cry of alarm as three red-hot glares turned on him at once. "A golem!" he squeaked more quietly.

Trendal knelt next to the necromancer and put his finger to the dust, to his tongue. He spat and they rose together. "Tastes like rust and poison," he said worriedly, looking at Sandro.

"What kind of training do you _get_ as a druid, exactly?" Ark asked suspiciously.

"Iron, then," the redheaded wizard said, ignoring his foster-brother. "Don't stay too close together; these footprints aren't old, even though it doesn't really look like this floor can hold an iron golem. It went through here recently." He glanced at Katrina, his raised eyebrows framing a silent question.

"I don't know anything about this place, and very little about him," she whispered. "As far as I'm aware, though, he's no mage, or even a spellcaster of any sort. Just an alchemist and physician. If there is some sort of automaton here, it might not be under his control."

"Someone could have moved in when he left," Arkantis suggested.

"This place would make a great hideout for bandits or someone else who didn't want a lot of company," Trendal agreed.

"All right," Sandro said finally, after a moment's thought. With a telepathic nudge, he sent his familiar winging to Arkantis's shoulder. "Take Hugin, so we can communicate. It's crude, but it will work. You and Katrina wait in here—" He gestured with his scythe toward a small, open sitting room just through a wide arch at the top of the stairs. "Ren and I will scout the rest of this floor, carefully, and come back. If you hear something like a smithy mating with an armory coming down the hall, don't wait for us—run. Go out the window if you have to."

"The window opens over a sheer cliff," his cousin pointed out helpfully.

"Whatever. I'm trusting you to keep yourself safe, and to watch Katrina." The bard considered the careful positioning of those words as his friends moved off, like a panther and a lynx, down the hallway to the right.

* * *

"Clear," Trendal hissed for the third time, darting his head in and out of another room. "You know, I never thought it would be like this—sneaking down hallways and wondering where the giant iron monster is, nervous excitement all the time. Really professional."

"Use the blade of your sword like a mirror to look around corners, so that something with yard-long claws doesn't take your nearsighted head off when you professionally stick it through a doorway."

"Ah. I should have thought of that."

"No matter, this is the last room." Sandro drew his dagger, angled the blade around the edge of the archway, studied the reflection for a moment, then resheathed it in the scabbard hanging from the back of his belt.

"Anything?" Ren asked tensely.

"There's a rat the size of your chicken in there, eating the furniture, but otherwise, it's empty."

"If you keep calling Stormfeather a chicken," Trendal threatened as they started back down the corridor together, "we are going to have such a row."

—_Sandro!—_

The necromancer reeled as Hugin's shout rebounded off the walls of his mind. Frowning, he thought back, —_What?—_

—_Hurry! Arkantis is choking and the girl in blue is gone!—_

He was already running, back down the hall, around the corner, Trendal pounding close behind, all pretense of stealth abandoned. —_What happened?—_

—_Sleep gas; alchemical, I think. Not a spell. It's coming through the cracks in the ceiling. It put the girl out in a blink, but he's fighting it. I'm beating his face with my wings to keep him with me, and she disappeared when I turned my back to her.—_

"Ark's fighting off sleep gas," Sandro reported to Trendal between strides. "Katrina's gone. Hugin says it's mundane."

"I have a healer's kit in my pack," Ren responded.

They skidded through the last few yards of dust and found Arkantis, pale and coughing, clawing his way out of the sitting room where they had left him with Katrina. He had dropped his sword, and Hugin was dancing back and forth like an agitated hen, flapping frantically at his head and face, slapping him with black-feathered wings. Sandro immediately knelt and peeled open one eyelid professionally, gently fending his panicked familiar away. The bard's pupil dilated in the glow of the green witchlight that limned his cousin's hands, and he sputtered wretchedly.

"He'll be fine," the mage told Trendal.

"Then help him clear his lungs," Ren advised, "and get him on his feet. I'll look him over in a moment. I'm going to check for Katrina." Fanning in front of his face with his shield, he waded into the noxious yellow-green mist that was slowly dispersing in the sitting room.

"Can you hear me?" Sandro asked his foster-brother.

"'m fine," the blond managed. "Tired…"

"It should wear off. Come on." He leaned his scythe against the landing's banister and slipped his arm under Arkantis's shoulders, hauling him upright. The musician took a couple of unsteady steps forward and put his hands shakily on the railing, but was able to support himself after less than a minute.

"Getting out of it probably helped it pass more quickly," Sandro commented when Arkantis professed his recovery. "Smart thinking."

"I didn't spend all that time with the Kingshands and learn nothing about alchemy," he smiled wanly.

Trendal came back into the hall, trailing little tendrils of sleeping gas but seemingly unaffected by the vile alchemical fumes. "Smells like three parts aniseed to four parts cesspool," the dark-haired young druid announced, making a face. "I don't have a clue what's really in it, but it ought to finish dissipating in a few minutes. How's Arkantis?" He sheathed his scimitar and began fussing over the protesting bard.

"I don't think there will be any lingering side effects," the wizard replied. "That means we can concentrate on Katrina. Did you see what happened to her in there, Ark?"

The bard shook his head, his long braid swinging. "We were just standing there, and then gas started leaking down from the ceiling. It was under pressure, because it didn't just drift down—it jetted out, right in my face, so I got a good strong dose. Hugin saved me, but Katrina dropped like a rock. She hit her head on that stuffed chair and fell next to the window, I think, but I didn't see anything else."

"'s about time for some recognition," Sandro's familiar, perched now on the banister, murmured out the side of his beak.

"So it was deliberate," Trendal guessed. "If there was some kind of silent alarm spell, it should have triggered when you entered the room. Someone knew we were here and waited until we left to get you two alone."

"Stupid!" Sandro berated himself savagely. "Stupid, leaving the two of them here. No help for it now. If she isn't here, someone's taken her, and they didn't go through the walls, because we just passed those rooms and they're open, like this one. We would have seen."

"The floor?" Ren suggested, drawing his sword again.

The necromancer shook his head, picking up his scythe. "We saw out that second window, remember? The sitting room is built like a balcony, overhanging the cliff. They'd go straight onto the rocks."

"That only leaves up," Arkantis noted, gathering his mislaid rapier from inside the sitting room doorway, where the gas had cleared. "So we start looking for hidden ladders?"

"What makes you think there's a ladder?"

"These two little round spots where the carpet has been flattened," the bard said, indicating them with his sword. "Like the ends of two poles, pressed in by heavy weight. The ladder drops down _here_, and so something carried Katrina up…_there_." He pointed at a spot in the ceiling; there was a nearly-imperceptible crack there, defining a square about four feet to a side.

"Well done, Little Brother," Sandro murmured, coming closer to inspect the trapdoor. "There must be an attic or tower. I think I saw some gables on the roof outside that would have had room for a third floor."

"How do we get up there, though?"

"Leave that to me." He reached into a finely-tooled black leather belt pouch and withdrew, without looking, a vial of quicksilver. Uncorking the vial, he tipped a single drop out into the air, waving his free hand in a vaguely circular motion while he intoned a Draconic keyword. Before the droplet could reach the floor, it halted in the air, expanding to become a transparent disk about a yard across. Sandro stoppered the vial and stepped onto the disk, which rose upward until it was about waist-high. From that height, the young mage was easily able to slip the point of his dagger into the crack and lever the trapdoor open, cutting whatever spring or wire held it shut with the finely-honed blade. He leaned back as the door fell, followed by a ladder that dropped past in sections, each greased and made to slide upward into the next.

The ladder banged into the disk in front of Sandro's feet, and he mentally nudged the magical construct backwards, letting the ladder finish its descent to the floor. He hopped off the disk and onto the ladder, scythe hooked over his shoulder. "Come on," he told his companions. "I'll leave this here; I shouldn't leave the spell's range, and we can use it to carry Katrina, if we need to."

"Why are you being so heroic for her, all of a sudden?" Trendal asked, mounting the ladder behind Sandro. "Just yesterday afternoon, you wanted to leave her on the beach so we could go home."

"And you two wouldn't let me," the redhead shot back. "There's no point arguing about it now. Hurry!"

The three of them ascended quickly to the third level, finding themselves in a closet-sized room at the top, its only door ajar. Flickering, oddly-colored light streamed through the crack, as well as a strange, low hum. Without hesitation, Trendal shunted the door open and leapt into the chamber beyond, followed closely by Sandro and Arkantis.

And there they stopped, frozen in horror.

The room was a mass of tangles and coils of cotton-insulated copper wire, connecting a series of metal boxes and devices covered in what appeared to be clock faces, like those in the mechanical timepieces crafted by Gondsmen on Toril. Some of them held racks of glass chambers filled with boiling green acid; others featured antennae-like rods that flickered with small bolts of lightning that leapt back and forth. Even Sandro was astonished; Ethric himself hadn't had anything like this in any room of his tall black tower.

Along one wall was a shelf full of bottles and jars containing colored liquids and powders, some of which looked vaguely medicinal, others explosive. Nearby were two slanted tables, one of which held Katrina, bound by fastened steel bands. Connected to it, the other slab held—

"Oh, gods," Arkantis gagged, biting his tongue to keep from retching.

The figure was gaunt to the point of emaciation, gray skin tight across thin bones. It looked as though it had once been female, but that it had long passed the point where gender was relevant. Its face was contorted in agony, its bulging eyes yellowed with pupils shrunk to pinpricks, and the distorted chest heaved with rapid, shallow breathing. Tubes and wires pierced and penetrated its body seemingly at random, some pumping oddly-colored fluids in, others sucking it out. It was truly horrific.

"Sune, Mystra, and the Evening Glory preserve us all," Sandro prayed.

"The only one here who is going to remain in any way preserved," said a voice from across the room, behind the machines, "is already on that table. The rest of you will just die." A man, of average height and build, dressed in faded aristocratic garb, stepped from the shadows. His pinched face twitched in odd places, and his gray hair and beard were wild and unkempt, though his eyes were strangely focused.

"I am Victor Mordenheim," he said, his tone almost casual. "Who are you, who assaults my home and interrupts my work?"

"Who we are doesn't matter," Sandro replied grimly. "We came for Katrina. Let us take her, and we'll leave."

"Oh, I couldn't do that," Mordenheim responded hazily. "You see, I need her body."

"What?" Arkantis yelped, the point of his rapier wavering unsteadily.

"For my wife," the madman said, indicating the monstrous figure next to the young diviner. "She needs a new one, you see. There are all sorts of issues—compatibility, composition of blood, kinship of life forces—and I would simply have so much trouble finding another suitable candidate."

"We're taking her," Trendal growled, stepping forward.

"The only thing you're taking is a short trip to hell," Mordenheim sang. There was a clanking of armor and a grinding of gears as the iron golem behind him lurched out of the shadows, looming over the three of them.

"Obliterate them," the lunatic ordered. Trendal gulped.

The golem raised its massive sword.


End file.
